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Dessert

Chocolate Caramel

A sweet sauce made from boiled sugar, sweet cream, vanilla, and chocolate, spread over a cake.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and chocolate 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 Caramel

Ingredients

Directions

Make the caramel

  1. Boil sugar and sweet cream together for 5 minutes.

  2. Remove from heat, add vanilla, and stir until creamy.

Assemble and top

  1. Spread the mixture over the cake.

  2. Melt the chocolate and spread it over the cream.

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. Vanilla + chocolatetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

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

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

  4. Cream + chocolatetop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,466 recipes

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

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

Sugar
Provides sweetness and, when boiled with cream, forms the thick caramel base.
Sweet cream
Adds fat and moisture, giving the caramel a smooth, soft texture.
Vanilla
Adds aroma that rounds out the sweetness of the caramel.
Chocolate
Melts into a rich, fatty layer that adds flavour and a smooth finish.

The step that matters

Boiling the sugar and cream for 5 minutes. Boiling evaporates water and concentrates the sugar, which thickens the mixture. Too short a boil leaves it runny, while too long can scorch the sugar and make it taste bitter.

“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.

More chocolate caramel recipes

Cake 16Icing 4Frosting 3Sauce 3 See all 14 →

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