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Dessert

Chocolate Pie

A chocolate pie with a buttery batter and chocolate frosting.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 9 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 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.

Make the batter

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

  2. Cream together the sugar and butter.

  3. Add the milk and mix well.

  4. Sift the flour with the baking powder and gradually add to the mixture.

  5. Incorporate the 5 eggs, leaving out the whites of 4.

  6. Pour the batter into Washington pie tins to make three two-layer pies.

Make the frosting and assemble

  1. Beat the reserved egg whites until stiff.

  2. Melt the chocolate in a saucer over steaming water until creamy.

  3. Mix the melted chocolate with the powdered sugar and vanilla.

  4. Spread the frosting between the layers and on top of the pies.

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. Butter + milktop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

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

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

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

  5. Butter + flourtop 12% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together124,287 recipes

    Shared aroma: isobutyraldehyde (malty, green).

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

Butter
Creams with sugar to add richness and a tender crumb.
Eggs
Add structure and richness to the batter as it sets in the oven.
Egg whites
Beaten until stiff to lighten the frosting and give it body.
Flour
Forms the main structure of the cake layers as it sets.
Baking powder
Releases gas in the batter, helping the layers rise.
Chocolate
Gives the frosting its chocolate flavor and color.

The step that matters

Beat the reserved egg whites until stiff. Egg whites only hold air when fully whipped and free of yolk or grease. Under-beaten or greasy whites collapse, leaving a dense, flat frosting.

“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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