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Drink

Cocoa Beverage

A beverage made by soaking and simmering cocoa nibs in water, then straining and skimming the fat from the top before serving.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 2 ingredients
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Why it works: Tea and cocoa work together. They rank in the top 8% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 43 recipes. Both carry 2-ethyl-3,6-dimethylpyrazine, which smells roasted, nutty. The science ↓

Cocoa Beverage

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Break cocoa nibs into small pieces using a rolling pin.

  2. Soak the nibs in cold water overnight.

Make the drink

  1. Simmer the nibs in the same water for 6 to 7 hours, adding water as needed to maintain the original quantity.

  2. Strain the liquid and let it cool.

  3. Skim the fat from the top before serving.

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. Tea + cocoatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-ethyl-3,6-dimethylpyrazine (roasted, nutty).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Cocoa nibs
Provide the cocoa flavour and solids that give the drink its body and taste.
Cold water
Extracts flavour from the nibs during soaking and long simmering, becoming the drink itself.

The step that matters

Simmer for 6 to 7 hours while keeping the water level up. Long, gentle simmering draws flavour and colour out of the nibs slowly. If the water drops too low, the extraction concentrates unevenly and the drink can taste harsh or burnt, so the original quantity must be maintained.

“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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