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Hot Chocolate Sauce
1 1/2 cups sugar 1/2 cup water 1/4 cup rich milk or water 4 squares unsweetened chocolate 1/2 teaspoon vanilla Let sugar and water boil in a saucepan for five minutes. Cool partly and gradually stir in the chocolate which has been melted over hot water. Add the vanilla. Place in a double boiler or in a pan over hot water until ready to serve. At the last moment, add the milk. (If to be used with ice-cream, use water instead of milk.)
A straightforward cooked chocolate sauce built on a sugar syrup rather than on cream. The order matters more than the timing: the syrup must cool below scalding before the melted chocolate goes in, or the chocolate seizes and turns grainy.
- Squares of chocolateA square of unsweetened chocolate is one ounce, so this calls for 4 oz total. Modern unsweetened baking chocolate works directly; check the scoring on the bar, as not all are divided into one-ounce pieces.
- Rich milkWhole milk at minimum; "rich" generally implied milk with the cream still in it, so half-and-half is probably the closer match. It goes in at the very end and is meant to loosen the sauce, not cook in it.
- The five-minute boilSugar and water boiled for five minutes reduce to a light syrup. That concentration is what keeps the finished sauce glossy and pourable rather than watery, so do not cut the boil short.
- Tempering the chocolate inMelt the chocolate in a bowl over hot, not boiling, water and let the syrup stand off the heat until it stops steaming heavily. Add the chocolate gradually, stirring smooth after each addition.
- Holding itThe double boiler is a holding device, not a cooking step. Keep the water hot but under a simmer; direct heat scorches a sauce this high in sugar quickly.
- Water for ice creamThe parenthetical is deliberate. Made with water the sauce firms up more on cold ice cream, closer to the effect of a hot fudge topping; with milk it stays softer.
- YieldRoughly 1 1/2 to 1 3/4 cups. It reheats over hot water with a spoonful of water or milk stirred in; refrigerate any that is kept.