Coo Coo for Cocoa - Milk Chocolate

Milk Chocolate

Most likely, of all types of chocolate, milk chocolate is your favorite and you don't even know it. Why? It's the most common.

Our Favorite Candy

Most of us grew up eating the supermarket favorites--Hershey bars, Hershey kisses, Snickers, Reese's, Milky Way, etc. Milk chocolate is the first chocolate most of us are exposed to. It's very sensitive to heat because it contains a lot of sugar. What differentiates it from other types of chocolate is that it contains 3.7% milk fats and 12% milk solids. Of course, it also has chocolate liquor like most chocolates, as well as vanilla and lecithin. Higher quality milk chocolate has more cocoa liquor.

Milk chocolate is even different in Europe than it is in America. Europeans use condensed milk in making milk chocolate, whereas Americans (and the British) contains a milk and sugar mixture. Here are some more facts about this favorite type of chocolate:

If a recipe calls for bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, don't use milk chocolate as a substitute. (An exception to this is chocolate chips. You can use milk chocolate chips in chocolate chip cookie recipes in place of semisweet chocolate chips.)
If you keep milk chocolate stored in a cool dry place, it will stay good for up to a year. However, avoid storing it in a refrigerator. Also, make sure to store it in its original wrapping or in foil.
Milk chocolate was originated by Daniel Peter of Switzerland when he was experimenting with mixing sugar, fat and condensed milk with the the cocoa nib. He started playing around with this mixture in 1867, but didn't perfect it until 1875.

Now you know more than you did before about milk chocolate.