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Dessert

Chocolate

A hot chocolate sauce made by melting chocolate with water, sugar, and milk.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 ingredients
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Why it works: Chocolate and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,404 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chocolate

Ingredients

Directions

Make the chocolate paste

  1. Break the chocolate into a small amount of boiling water.

  2. Stir over heat until it forms a smooth paste.

  3. If using unsweetened chocolate, add the sugar.

Finish the sauce

  1. Gradually add the boiling water and scalded milk.

  2. Stir thoroughly and let it simmer for 10 minutes.

  3. Serve hot.

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Chocolate + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

    Shared aroma: gamma-nonanolactone (coconut, sweet).

  3. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Baker's chocolate
Provides the main chocolate flavour and, once melted smooth, the sauce's body.
Granulated sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the bitterness of unsweetened chocolate.
Milk
Adds creaminess and richness, softening the chocolate's sharpness and thickening the sauce slightly.

The step that matters

Gradually add the boiling water and scalded milk. Melted chocolate can seize and turn grainy or lumpy if liquid is poured in all at once or is too cold. Adding hot liquid slowly while stirring keeps the mixture smooth and emulsified.

“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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