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Dessert

Chocolate Custard

A custard made with eggs, sugar, chocolate, milk, and vanilla.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 Custard

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the eggs and sugar

  1. Beat the yolks of the eggs separately.

  2. Beat the whites of the eggs separately.

  3. Add the sugar to the beaten yolks and mix the yolks and sugar well.

Make the chocolate mixture

  1. Melt the chocolate with a little hot water.

  2. Combine the melted chocolate with the milk.

  3. Bring the chocolate-milk mixture to a boil.

  4. Pour the hot chocolate mixture over the egg yolk mixture, stirring the mixture constantly.

Cook the custard

  1. Place the mixture in a pitcher.

  2. Set the pitcher in boiling water.

  3. Stir the custard constantly until it thickens.

  4. Add vanilla and mix the custard well.

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

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

  4. Sugar + chocolatetop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together15,404 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

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

Eggs
Yolks thicken the custard as they set, and whites are beaten separately for the recipe.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and helps balance the bitterness of the chocolate.
Chocolate
Provides the main chocolate flavor and richness to the custard.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the eggs thicken into a custard.

The step that matters

Pour the hot chocolate mixture over the egg yolk mixture while stirring constantly. Pouring hot liquid onto yolks too fast or without stirring can scramble the eggs. Constant stirring spreads the heat evenly so the yolks warm gently and thicken smoothly.

“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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