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Dessert

Chocolate Cream Custard

A chocolate custard made with milk, gelatin, eggs, sugar, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and vanilla are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 19,187 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Chocolate Cream Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the gelatine and milk

  1. Soak gelatine in ½ cup of milk for 1 hour.

  2. Heat the remaining milk to boiling.

  3. Stir in the soaked gelatine until dissolved.

Make the custard

  1. In a bowl, mix sugar with beaten egg yolks until smooth.

  2. Gradually stir in the chocolate and scalding milk mixture.

  3. Return to heat and gently beat until it almost boils.

  4. Remove from heat and transfer to a bowl.

  5. Quickly fold in the beaten egg whites.

Mould and cool

  1. Pour into a cold water-wetted mold and let cool.

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 + vanillatop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

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

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

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

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

  4. Chocolate + sugartop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, 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

Eggs
Yolks thicken the custard and whites add lightness when folded in.
Gelatine
Sets the liquid custard into a firm, sliceable structure as it cools.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the custard and gelatine are built on.
Grated chocolate
Provides the chocolate flavour and colour throughout the custard.
Sugar
Sweetens the custard and balances the bitterness of the chocolate.

The step that matters

Quickly fold in the beaten egg whites. Egg whites hold air only while whipped, and they deflate if overmixed or left to stand. Folding gently and promptly keeps the custard light, while the gelatine sets the mixture before it fully settles.

“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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