Why it works: Milk and corn are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 6,955 recipes. Both carry hexanal, which smells green, grassy. The science ↓
Chocolate Pudding
Ingredients
Directions
Boil the milk in a saucepan.
Stir in the chocolate until melted.
Dissolve the corn starch in a little water and add it to the chocolate milk.
Beat the eggs and mix them with the sugar and salt.
Combine the egg mixture with the chocolate mixture and cook until thickened.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
The flavor team
The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.
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Milk + corntop 10% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together6,955 recipes
Shared aroma: hexanal (green, grassy).
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Chocolate + sugartop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together15,404 recipes
Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).
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Milk + chocolatetop 13% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together9,128 recipes
Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).
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Chocolate + corntop 17% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together987 recipes
Shared aroma: ethyl cinnamate (sweet, balsamic).
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Milk + eggtop 18% of all pairsSmell alikemoderateCooked together88,785 recipes
Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).
Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs
What each ingredient does
- Corn starch
- Thickens the pudding into a smooth, sliceable custard as it cooks.
- Eggs
- Add richness and help set the pudding as they cook with the thickened milk.
- Milk
- Forms the liquid base that the starch and eggs thicken.
- Chocolate
- Provides the chocolate flavour and some body to the pudding.
- Sugar
- Sweetens the pudding and balances the bitterness of the chocolate.
The step that matters
Cook the egg mixture with the chocolate mixture until thickened. Starch thickens only when heated enough, but eggs can curdle if they get too hot or cook too fast. Stir constantly and cook gently until the pudding thickens, then remove it from the heat.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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