Home Made Hot Chocolate

When the weather gets colder, its nice to curl up on the sofa with a good book and a hot drink -how wonderfully cliche. My absolute favourite hot drink has to be hot chocolate!

To be quite honest I find powdered hot chocolate disgusting and strangely salty at times! Yet I willingly put up with it until I discovered the way to make "real" hot chocolate. Try and buy good quality cooking chocolate so you dont have to worry about all those chemicals and e-numbers. 

If you make hot chocolate quite often, prepare the chocolate in bulk then making this will be just as simple as using the powdered stuff.

Home Made Hot Chocolate

Serves 2

~2 cups of milk 

  -you can use skim milk, but if you are drinking hot chocolate and worrying about your figure at the same time there is something wrong!

~1/2 tsp of vanila sugar  

  -If you dont have any Vanilla sugar just 2 drops of vanilla essence is fine

  -you make vanilla sugar by putting a vanilla pod in some sugar. The longer the pod is in, the yummier it will taste!

~A sprinkle of cinnamon 

  -just to add a little holiday warmth

~75 grams Good Quality Cooking Chocolate

  -Remember your hot chocolate will taste like your chocolate, so if you prefer dark chocolate go for it! Don't feel limited by the massive amounts of milk chocolate out there. Choose the type of chocolate you love!

Firstly dice up the chocolate as finely as you can, the smaller the pieces the easier they will melt. 

In a small saucepan heat up the milk to near boiling- milk doesn't boil like water does, there are no obvious signs. If your not sure if its hot enough just put it on the flame on med. and wait for aprox. 5 mins-  Whisk in the cinnamon and Vanilla sugar/essence, when throughly combined start adding the chocolate slowly. Keep whisking while you add the chocolate or you will end up with burnt chocolate stuck to the bottom. When you have added all the chocolate the milk should have turned a deep chocolatey brown. Serve hot! 

Optional: you could add whipped cream/diced nuts/chocolate sauce/milk foam on top when served to add a little omph!