Skip to main content
Dessert

Chocolate Caramels

Chocolate caramels are a sweet treat made by cooking chocolate, brown sugar, cream, butter, and vanilla until a soft ball stage.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
Jump to recipe ↓

Why it works: Chocolate and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 10,020 recipes. Both carry sotolon, which smells curry, maple. The science ↓

Chocolate Caramels

Ingredients

Directions

Make the caramel

  1. Melt the chocolate in a saucepan.

  2. Add the brown sugar, cream, and butter, stirring constantly.

  3. Cook until the mixture reaches a soft ball stage, about 1½ hours.

  4. Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla.

Set and cut

  1. Pour the mixture into a buttered dish and let it cool.

  2. Cut into 1-inch squares.

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. Chocolate + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  2. Cream + buttertop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together41,516 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Chocolate + creamtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,466 recipes

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

Sugar and vanilla barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 35,032 recipes: they work on texture and structure more than aroma.

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

What each ingredient does

Baker's chocolate
Provides the chocolate flavor and color of the caramel.
Light brown sugar
Provides sweetness and molasses flavor, and helps the caramel set chewy.
Cream
Adds moisture and fat, giving the caramel a softer, creamier texture.
Butter
Adds fat for richness and a smooth, tender bite.

The step that matters

Cooking to the soft ball stage. Sugar syrup must reach the right temperature to set correctly. Too little cooking leaves the caramel soft and sticky, while overcooking makes it hard and brittle. Stirring constantly helps prevent scorching on the bottom of the pan.

“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.

You might also like

Chocolate CreamChocolate Cream171 recipesVanilla Ice CreamVanilla Ice Cream108 recipesChocolate CookiesChocolate Cookies76 recipesChocolate FudgeChocolate Fudge55 recipes