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Dessert

Chocolate Jelly

A chilled dessert made from gelatin, milk, chocolate, sugar, 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 Jelly

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Dissolve the gelatine in ½ cup of milk and let it stand for a few hours.

  2. Mix the grated chocolate and sugar into a smooth paste with some milk.

Make the custard

  1. Heat the gelatine with another ½ cup of milk until nearly boiling.

  2. Add the chocolate paste and sugar, and boil for 10 minutes while stirring continuously.

  3. Remove from heat, add the essence of vanilla, and pour into a mould.

Set

  1. Refrigerate until set, preferably overnight.

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  5. Milk + chocolatetop 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

Gelatine
Sets the milk mixture into a firm, wobbly gel once chilled.
Milk
Provides the liquid that hydrates the gelatine and forms the body of the dessert.
Grated chocolate
Supplies the chocolate flavour and dark colour of the set dessert.
Sugar
Adds sweetness and balances the bitterness of the chocolate.

The step that matters

Boiling the chocolate mixture while stirring. Gelatine needs to be fully dissolved and the chocolate evenly blended before setting. Constant stirring prevents scorching on the base of the pan and stops lumps forming, so the final gel sets smooth and even.

“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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