Hot Chocolate, version 2: Cocoa Mix

As promised last week, we are now going to make hot chocolate the easiest of ways, from a mix. However, as this is also from scratch, we have to make the mix. I'm essentially using the Good Eats cocoa mix, with some minor flavor variations, because most of the other cocoa mixes rely upon non-dairy creamer. In my wild and undisciplined youth, I would use non-dairy creamer in coffee that was brewed to be stronger than anything short of Black Blood of the Earth, which made for some serious caffeination and a very strong flavor. Still, one eventually grows out of such phases and I have shunned non-dairy creamers. They're handy if you need a creamer and can't or won't handle dairy, but it is essentially a lot of work to reproduce something that is, as these things go, relatively natural.

Instead of non-dairy creamer, we are going to use powdered whole milk. Not nonfat powdered milk. No, down that path lies disappointing instant cocoa. Mind you, your chances of finding powdered whole milk at the local grocery store are slim at best, because for some reason people who use powdered milk don't actually want anything that tastes vaguely worth drinking. Some of it's for thing like making bread and the like, but it's just odd that the entire market for powdered milk is less than that of, say, pork brains in milk gravy, which is easy to find at many grocery stores. Never fear, though, because not only does amazon have powdered whole milk, but it's available through Amazon Prime, so you can get it in 2 days with free shipping, so just plan ahead a bit and you'll be fine.

So you assemble your ingredients. For sweetening, we use powdered sugar, because it dissolves easily. Your cocoa should be of the highest quality. Some prefer dutch processed, but I'm okay with regular. There's a bit of cornstarch in order to capture moisture that might otherwise clump the milk. Salt to bring out flavor. And cinnamon and ancho chile powder for flavor. Note that this is not chili powder, which has garlic and cumin in it and, while great, does not make for tasty cocoa. This is simply dried and powdered ancho chiles. The original recipe calls for cayenne, but I like different chile powders.

Measure your ingredients out and mix them together. You'll probably find that sifting is a good idea. Don't go crazy with the chile powder; just use a pinch. if you want more, you can add it later, but it will quickly spice up your cocoa, and some people might not want too spicy of a cocoa.

Fill your cups halfway with the mixture. Yes, halfway. You can see that, at this point, I hadn't sifted the mixture, so it's a bit clumpy. Before storage we sifted though.

Pour in some recently-boiling water. Stir. (Yes, I know you know how to make cocoa from a mix.) You could use a hot milk at this point, but you really don't need to. Seriously: whole milk powder.

Store the mix in an airtight container. It will last a long, long time.

So now you have the easiest version of cocoa, and you have the tastiest version of cocoa. My preference is for the tastiest version, but there's no denying convenience. The great thing is that this convenience does not have to come with the baggage of commodity ingredients of industrial chemicals. Make a batch today and enjoy it all season long.

Comments

[Wendi @ Bon Appetit Hon]

I made Alton's hot chocolate mix and found that when I added the hot liquid there were clumps that didn't dissolve. Did sifting prevent this problem for you?

[Brian]

It helps quite a bit, but it's not foolproof. Part of the problem is that there is probably a bit more cocoa mix than is strictly necessary. So combine sifting with maybe a bit less than 1/2 the cup filled with cocoa powder, and you should have most of it dissolve.

[Herr Direktor Funranium]

Right. Now I have a holiday experiment to perform and feed to my Lovely Assistant. Her Strategic Chocolate Reserve is quite impressive and some small part of it could be allocated to this purpose.