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Dessert

Chocolate Caramels

A caramel candy made with sugar, glucose, molasses, water, milk, butter, and chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Chocolate Caramels

Ingredients

Directions

Make the caramel

  1. Combine water, milk, and molasses in a large saucepan; add sugar and stir until dissolved.

  2. When the mixture boils, add the chocolate and let it melt without stirring.

  3. Add the butter and do not stir after this point.

  4. Test the mixture by wetting a finger, dipping it into the boiling mixture, then plunging it into cold water; it should not burn your finger.

  5. When the candy hardens to the breaking point in water, remove it from heat.

Set and cut

  1. Pour the mixture quickly into a buttered tin, avoiding scraping the saucepan to prevent sugar crystallization.

  2. Let the candy cool, then cut into squares and wrap each square in oiled paper.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

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.

  1. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  4. Milk + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  5. Butter + chocolatetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,543 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Provides sweetness and, as it cooks, forms the firm caramel structure.
Butter
Adds fat for a soft, rich texture and smooth mouthfeel.
Glucose
Interferes with sugar crystal formation, keeping the caramel smooth rather than grainy.
Dark molasses
Adds deep flavour and colour, plus extra moisture and softness.
Milk
Contributes milk solids that add creaminess and help the caramel brown.
Unsweetened chocolate
Adds chocolate flavour and fat, deepening the richness of the caramel.

The step that matters

Avoid scraping the saucepan when pouring. Scraping can dislodge sugar crystals from the pan sides into the batch, where they can seed crystallization and make the caramel grainy.

“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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