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Drink

Cocoa Nibs

A sweetened cocoa drink made with cocoa shells, water, milk, broma, and thickened with cornstarch.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 ingredients
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Why it works: Cocoa and milk work together. They rank in the top 10% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 643 recipes. Both carry methyl 2-methylbutyrate, which smells fruity, apple. The science ↓

Cocoa Nibs

Ingredients

Directions

Make the cocoa base

  1. Wet the cocoa shells and let them steep for 1 hour.

  2. Stir the steeped cocoa shells into 1 quart of boiling water and cook slowly for 1 hour.

  3. Strain the mixture and add 2 cups of scalded milk. Sweeten to taste.

Make the broma drink

  1. In a separate pot, combine 2 cups of boiling water and 2 cups of boiling milk.

  2. Stir in 1.5 tablespoons of broma (previously blended with water) and boil for 5 to 10 minutes.

  3. Add 1 teaspoon of cornstarch mixed with a little water and stir until thickened. Sweeten to taste.

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. Cocoa + milktop 10% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together643 recipes

    Shared aroma: methyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

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

What each ingredient does

Cocoa shells
Provide the cocoa flavour and colour as they steep and simmer in water.
Broma
Adds body and a rich cocoa flavour to the milk-based drink.
Cornstarch
Thickens the liquid as it heats, giving it a smoother, heavier body.
Milk
Adds creaminess and richness, softening the cocoa's bitterness.

The step that matters

Add the cornstarch slurry while stirring. Cornstarch must be mixed with cold water first and stirred into a hot liquid. Added dry or unstirred, it clumps, and it thickens only once the mixture is near a simmer.

“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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