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Dessert

Chocolate Sauce

A sauce made by boiling chocolate with milk, sweetened with sugar and vanilla, then folded into beaten egg and cooked until set.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 5 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 Sauce

Ingredients

Directions

Make the sauce

  1. Dissolve the chocolate in the milk and bring to a boil.

  2. Add vanilla and sugar to taste.

  3. Pour the hot mixture over the beaten egg while whisking continuously.

  4. Return to the pan and whisk over low heat until the egg is cooked but not curdled.

Serve

  1. Serve immediately.

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. Chocolate + milktop 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

Chocolate
Melts into the milk to give the sauce its flavour and body.
Milk
Forms the liquid base that the chocolate melts into and thins the sauce.
Egg
Thickens the sauce as it gently cooks, giving it a smooth, custard-like texture.

The step that matters

Return to the pan and whisk over low heat until the egg is cooked but not curdled.. Egg proteins set when heated, so high heat or long cooking can scramble the egg and make the sauce grainy. Gentle heat and constant whisking keep it smooth and thickened.

“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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