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Chocolate Fondants

Chocolate Fondants are small chocolate cakes coated in melted chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 ingredients
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Why it works: Vanilla and coconut match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 2,294 recipes. Both carry ethyl caproate, which smells fruity, apple peel. The science ↓

Chocolate Fondants

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Shape the fondant into small rounds or ovals and let them stand for 12 hours.

Dip and set

  1. Melt the covering chocolate in a double boiler, ensuring it doesn't get too hot.

  2. Dip the fondant shapes into the melted chocolate using a dipping fork and place them on grease-proof 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 + coconuttop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together2,294 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. Sugar + vanillatop 8% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together35,032 recipes

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

  4. Chocolate + coconuttop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together1,107 recipes

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

  5. Cream + sugartop 9% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together43,450 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2,3-butanedione (butter, 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

Fondant
Forms the sweet, firm centre that the chocolate coating surrounds.
Covering chocolate
Forms a thin, glossy shell around the fondant when melted and set.

The step that matters

Melting the covering chocolate gently. Chocolate that overheats can seize or lose its gloss and set dull or streaked. Melting slowly in a double boiler keeps it fluid and smooth for an even coating.

Swap the coconut

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (cream, sugar, vanilla, chocolate):

  1. Coconutthe original
  2. Strawberryfits about as well
  3. Raspberryfits about as well
  4. Figfits less well

Fit is the average pairing score against cream, sugar, vanilla, chocolate. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes.

“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.

More chocolate fondant recipes

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