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Caramels, Chocolate

Chocolate caramels made by boiling sugar, milk, cream, and chocolate until set.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and milk 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 ↓

Caramels, Chocolate

Ingredients

Directions

Make the caramel

  1. Dissolve the sugar in the milk and add the cream.

  2. Bring the mixture slowly to a boil.

  3. Dissolve the chocolate in a small amount of hot water and stir it into the syrup.

  4. Boil gently until a drop in cold water hardens and snaps easily.

Set and finish

  1. Pour onto an oiled slab or into an oiled tin.

  2. When cold, cut into squares with a caramel cutter or a buttered knife.

  3. Wrap each piece in wax paper.

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. Vanilla + milktop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together19,187 recipes

    Shared aroma: ethyl caproate (fruity, apple peel).

  2. Vanilla + chocolatetop 5% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,020 recipes

    Shared aroma: sotolon (curry, maple).

  3. Vanilla + sugartop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Sugar + creamtop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, sweet).

  5. Chocolate + creamtop 11% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together5,466 recipes

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

Vanilla and sugar 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

Sugar
Provides sweetness and, when boiled, forms the firm body of the caramel.
Cream
Adds fat and richness, giving the caramel a softer, smoother texture.
Milk
Adds moisture and milk solids that contribute to the caramel's flavour and colour.
Chocolate
Supplies cocoa flavour and fat, and colours the caramel.

The step that matters

Boil gently until a drop in cold water hardens and snaps easily.. Caramel sets by cooking off water and concentrating sugar. Stopping too early leaves it soft and sticky; cooking too long makes it hard and brittle. Testing a drop in cold water shows when the sugar reaches the right concentration.

“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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