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Drink

Chocolate

A chocolate beverage made by melting chocolate in water, cooling, then mixing with milk and sugar.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Chocolate and sugar are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 13% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 15,404 recipes. Both carry guaiacol, which smells smoky, sweet. The science ↓

Chocolate

Ingredients

Directions

Make the chocolate base

  1. Cut the chocolate into very small pieces.

  2. Boil the water in a pot.

  3. Add the chocolate to the boiling water and remove from heat until melted.

  4. Return to gentle heat and bring to a boil.

  5. Pour the chocolate into a basin and let it cool; it will keep for ten days.

Serve

  1. When ready to serve, add 1-2 spoonfuls of chocolate to fresh milk.

  2. Boil with sugar.

  3. Mix well.

  4. Melt to a fine froth and serve.

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

  2. Chocolate + milktop 13% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together9,128 recipes

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

  3. Sugar + milktop 18% of all pairs
    Smell alikelow
    Cooked together77,875 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-nonenal (fatty, green).

Sugar and milk barely smell alike, yet cooks put them together in 77,875 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

Chocolate
Provides the cocoa flavour and body that gives the drink its chocolate character.
Fresh milk
Forms the main liquid base and adds creaminess and richness to the drink.
Sugar
Adds sweetness, balancing the bitterness of the cocoa.

The step that matters

Boil with sugar. Milk can scorch or boil over quickly on direct heat, and it needs gentle, attentive heating so it does not burn on the bottom of the pot. Stirring keeps the chocolate evenly dispersed.

“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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