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Chocolate Frosting

A frosting made by mixing melted chocolate with a boiled sugar and milk base and butter.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 4 ingredients
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Why it works: Milk and butter are a kitchen classic. They rank in the top 7% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 81,283 recipes. Both carry (z)-4-heptenal, which smells biscuit, cream. The science ↓

Chocolate Frosting

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare

  1. Melt the chocolate in a large pie tin and keep it warm.

Make and spread the frosting

  1. Beat the melted chocolate into the boiled frosting until evenly mixed.

  2. In a saucepan, stir together the sugar and milk until dissolved.

  3. Boil the mixture for 12 minutes, then remove from heat and stir until it reaches a spreadable consistency.

  4. Spread the frosting quickly as it hardens rapidly.

  5. Melt the chocolate over steam, then mix in the butter and spread over the white frosting.

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 + buttertop 7% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together81,283 recipes

    Shared aroma: (z)-4-heptenal (biscuit, cream).

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

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

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

  4. Chocolate + buttertop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together10,543 recipes

    Shared aroma: delta-decalactone (sweet, creamy).

  5. Sugar + buttertop 17% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together98,233 recipes

    Shared aroma: guaiacol (smoky, sweet).

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

What each ingredient does

Chocolate
Provides the main flavour and fat, and firms as the frosting cools.
Sugar
Sweetens the frosting and, once boiled, helps it set to a thick texture.
Milk
Adds moisture and helps dissolve the sugar into a smooth base.
Butter
Adds fat for a softer, smoother finish in the frosting.

The step that matters

Boil for 12 minutes, then stir until spreadable. Boiling concentrates the sugar, and as the mixture cools it crystallises and sets. Stirring at the right moment gives a spreadable texture, and the frosting must then be spread quickly before it hardens.

“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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