With my Nielsen-Massey Vanilla trio in hand, I am off to the hot chocolate races. First up, is the Mexican Vanilla. According to the Nielsen-Massey box, Mexican Vanilla is one of the best Vanillas for chocolate and cinnamon. This is perfect for my recipe! When I think of Mexico I think of fruity flavors…why… I don’t know but orange came to my head.
Nonetheless, the recipe I came up with was ¾ cup whole milk, 2 tsp Mexican Vanilla, 2 tbls Orange Juice, 1 Cinnamon stick, 1 tbls Sugar and 2 tbls of NoMU Cocoa Powder. The most important ingredient, of course, is the cocoa powder. The one selected for this brew is NoMU from Cape Town, South Africa. I found this bad boy on one of my many adventures back home to California. NoMU’s cocoa powder is Dutch Processed which means the cocoa was processed with an alkalizing agent (potassium carbonate) to remove the acidity from the cocoa.
In order to capture the true essence of the Vanilla, I decided to add the Vanilla and Cinnamon stick to the milk and let everything “marinate” in the ‘frig for a few hours.
A little while later, I added the rest of the ingredients to my double boiler, mixed it up and heated through. Since I can’t stand skim, I always heat my hot chocolate creations on a medium-low heat and stir consistently to avoid a skim appearance.
Since my husband’s friend Micah was visiting us, we had a hot chocolate and cocoa infused dessert festival. Micah thought the Mexican Hot Chocolate was “earthy and calming”. Also, he liked the after kick of the Orange Juice. Frank, my husband, enjoyed this one too, but he loves anything with chocolate.
Next up is the Tahitian Vanilla….
Nonetheless, the recipe I came up with was ¾ cup whole milk, 2 tsp Mexican Vanilla, 2 tbls Orange Juice, 1 Cinnamon stick, 1 tbls Sugar and 2 tbls of NoMU Cocoa Powder. The most important ingredient, of course, is the cocoa powder. The one selected for this brew is NoMU from Cape Town, South Africa. I found this bad boy on one of my many adventures back home to California. NoMU’s cocoa powder is Dutch Processed which means the cocoa was processed with an alkalizing agent (potassium carbonate) to remove the acidity from the cocoa.
In order to capture the true essence of the Vanilla, I decided to add the Vanilla and Cinnamon stick to the milk and let everything “marinate” in the ‘frig for a few hours.
A little while later, I added the rest of the ingredients to my double boiler, mixed it up and heated through. Since I can’t stand skim, I always heat my hot chocolate creations on a medium-low heat and stir consistently to avoid a skim appearance.
Since my husband’s friend Micah was visiting us, we had a hot chocolate and cocoa infused dessert festival. Micah thought the Mexican Hot Chocolate was “earthy and calming”. Also, he liked the after kick of the Orange Juice. Frank, my husband, enjoyed this one too, but he loves anything with chocolate.
Next up is the Tahitian Vanilla….
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