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Dessert

Chocolate Cream Pie

A chocolate custard filling baked in a pastry crust and topped with whipped cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Sugar and cream are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 9% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43,450 recipes. Both carry 2,3-butanedione, which smells butter, sweet. The science ↓

Chocolate Cream Pie

Ingredients

Directions

The book gives no oven temperature. The 350°F (175°C) in the steps was added when the recipe was transcribed, as a starting point.

Prepare the crust

  1. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C).

  2. Line a small pie plate with pastry.

  3. Bake until golden.

Make the filling

  1. Heat the milk in a saucepan.

  2. Blend the cornstarch and sugar with the beaten egg in a bowl.

  3. Add the mixture to the heated milk and cook until thick.

  4. Stir in the melted chocolate until well combined.

  5. Pour the chocolate filling into the baked crust.

  6. Let it cool.

Finish and serve

  1. Cover the pie with whipped cream just before serving.

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

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

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

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

  3. Chocolate + sugartop 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. Milk + creamtop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together29,399 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Milk
Forms the liquid base that thickens into the custard filling.
Unsweetened chocolate
Gives the filling its chocolate flavour and deep colour.
Cornstarch
Thickens the milk mixture as it cooks, giving the filling its set.
Egg
Adds richness and helps bind and thicken the custard.
Sugar
Sweetens the filling and balances the bitterness of the chocolate.

The step that matters

Cooking the filling until thick. Cornstarch must reach a simmer and cook for a while to swell and thicken fully. Undercooked starch leaves the filling thin and runny, and it will not set properly as it cools.

“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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