Skip to main content
Dessert

Chocolate Biscuit

A light chocolate biscuit made with beaten egg yolks, whites, and flour, baked at 300°F.

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

Why it works: Flour and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 12% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 124,287 recipes. Both carry isobutyraldehyde, which smells malty, green. The science ↓

Chocolate Biscuit

Oven, in the book's wordsA slow oven

Ingredients

Directions

The book says “a slow oven”. The 300°F (150°C) in the steps is the modern equivalent, not the book's own figure.

Prepare

  1. Preheat the oven to 300°F (150°C).

  2. Grease three large baking pans with washed butter.

  3. Cover the pans with parchment paper.

  4. Dredge the parchment paper with powdered sugar.

Make the batter

  1. Melt the chocolate in a cup.

  2. Beat the egg yolks with ½ cup powdered sugar until light and firm.

  3. Add the melted chocolate to the yolk mixture and beat for a few more minutes.

  4. Beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form.

  5. Gently fold the flour and beaten egg whites into the yolk mixture, being careful not to overmix.

Bake

  1. Drop teaspoonfuls of the mixture onto the prepared baking paper.

  2. Sprinkle additional powdered sugar over the cakes.

  3. Bake for about 14 to 15 minutes.

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. Flour + buttertop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  3. Sugar + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together92,116 recipes

    Shared aroma: phenylacetaldehyde (hawthorne, honey).

  4. Egg + flourtop 15% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together106,462 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

  5. Chocolate + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,543 recipes

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

Flour and butter barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 124,287 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
Whites trap air for lift, and yolks add richness and structure to the batter.
Flour
Provides structure so the cakes hold their shape as they set in the oven.
Chocolate
Supplies the chocolate flavor and some richness to the batter.
Powdered sugar
Sweetens the batter and dries the surface for a light dusting.

The step that matters

Gently fold the flour and beaten egg whites into the yolk mixture. Overmixing knocks air out of the whipped egg whites, so the cakes bake flat and dense instead of light and tender.

“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 recipesChocolate CookiesChocolate Cookies76 recipesChocolate FudgeChocolate Fudge55 recipesChocolate Drop CookiesChocolate Drop Cookies50 recipes