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Dessert

Chocolate Blanc Mange

A gelatin-set chocolate custard made with milk, eggs, sugar, vanilla, and grated chocolate.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 7 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 Blanc Mange

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the gelatine

  1. Soak the gelatin in 1 cup of milk for 1 hour.

  2. Heat 1 quart of milk to boiling.

  3. Stir in the soaked gelatin until dissolved.

Make the mousse base

  1. In a bowl, mix sugar with beaten egg yolks until smooth.

  2. Gradually add the hot milk mixture to the egg yolk mixture, stirring continuously.

  3. Return the mixture to the saucepan and heat gently, stirring until it almost boils.

  4. Remove from heat and fold in the beaten egg whites and vanilla.

Set

  1. Pour into molds that have been wet with cold water and let set.

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, sliceable mousse as it cools.
Eggs
Egg yolks thicken the custard, and beaten whites add lightness and airy texture.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the gelatine and eggs set into a creamy body.
Sugar
Sweetens the mousse and balances the richness of the eggs and milk.

The step that matters

Heating the egg yolk mixture gently. Egg yolks can curdle or scramble if overheated. Heating gently and stirring until it just nears boiling thickens the custard smoothly without turning it grainy.

“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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