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Dessert

Chocolate Cream Candy

A sweet candy made from sugar, molasses, milk, butter, baking soda, and chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Chocolate Cream Candy

Ingredients

Directions

Make the candy

  1. In a saucepan, combine sugar, molasses, milk, and butter.

  2. Boil for about 25 minutes without stirring, except to prevent burning.

  3. Just before removing from heat, add baking soda and grated chocolate.

  4. Test in cold water; when brittle, it's done.

Set and cut

  1. Pour into a buttered pan and cool.

  2. Once cool, cut into 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. Milk + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

  2. Sugar + molassestop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,225 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethanol (alcoholic, ethereal).

  3. Sugar + chocolatetop 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. Butter + chocolatetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,543 recipes

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

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

What each ingredient does

Sugar
Provides sweetness and forms the firm, brittle structure as the mixture cooks down.
Molasses
Adds deep flavor and color, and contributes to the candy's chewy, dense texture.
Milk
Adds richness and creaminess, giving the candy a softer, smoother body.
Butter
Adds fat for smoothness and a rich mouthfeel in the finished candy.
Baking soda
Reacts with the hot mixture to lighten its texture and add a little rise.
Chocolate
Adds chocolate flavor and a deeper color to the candy.

The step that matters

Testing in cold water. Sugar candy sets according to how far its water has evaporated and how concentrated the sugar has become. Pulling it off heat too early leaves a soft, sticky result, while cooking too long makes it hard and bitter. A small drop in cold water shows the stage by becoming brittle.

“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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