Forget green beer! Give me an Irish hot chocolate

Today, I celebrated St. Patrick's Day with a mug of Gourmet du Village's Irish Cream Hot Chocolate.  When an instant hot chocolate is desired, I reach for Gourmet du Village or Ghirardelli.  This was exciting since I never tasted an Irish Cream drink before...not even a shot!

After heating up the milk and adding the hot chocolate packet, I stirred the mixture.  A nice creme layer appeared.  Yum.  I proceed to the backyard to sit out and savor my cup of heaven.

The first sip was very fulfilling and the creme layer added lift to the beverage.  I must say, I will keep a few packets of this one in my cupboards.

Happy Valentine's Day

Closing out a delicious cocoa inspired year, part II

I started the fondue with four (4) Luker Bitter Chocolate squares and two (2) SOL Chocolate with brown sugar squares. Since Luker is 100% pure cocoa chocolate, the SOL was added to sweeten the mix. Both chocolates were added to my double boiler along with one (1) teaspoon of Mexican Vanilla. Since the SOL chocolate has a grainy texture with visible brown sugar granules, the overall texture of the fondue was grainy as well. This definitely wouldn’t do!

Around a half cup of evaporated milk was added for smoothness along with two (2) more squares of SOL chocolate. The bitter chocolate is quite overwhelming and I didn’t want an extremely sweet fondue, but one that would balance the flavor of various fruits and cheeses. I decided to add a cinnamon orange sugar blend I purchased during one of my trips back to California. After multiple sugar additions, one (1) additional teaspoon of Mexican Vanilla and a desire to throw in two Vanilla Bean Marshmallows from Plush Puffs things started to look up. Ahhh…my creation was official.

When it came time to dine, my other half was quite pleased. Considering he was frowning at the sample I provided in the beginning of my fondue making experience, he truly enjoyed the final result.

So, here is how we welcomed the 2009 in our house!

Closing out a delicious cocoa inspired year

This year my husband and I will be celebrating New Years at home. We decided to organize a small celebration to welcome in the new year. Of course, the celebratory activities, mainly eating and drinking, must include some form of hot chocolate or cocoa.

Along with our cheese and crackers and crab stuffed oyster shells, we are adding a dessert fondue to the menu. Since I didn’t have whipped cream or evaporated milk to make fondue from scratch, I decided to make my “own” fondue with Luker Bitter Chocolate and Sol Chocolate de Mesa con Azucar Morena (a hot chocolate table chocolate with brown sugar), a cinnamon orange sugar blend, Mexican Vanilla, Evaporated Milk and Vanilla Bean Marshmallows by Plush Puffs. Both chocolates hail from Columbia.

I know this isn’t a very nutritious recipe in the making, but I rather work with what I have then be on the road with potential drunks. Here are a few pictures of my work in progress. Stay tuned for the outcome…

Egg Nog for Inspiration

With another holiday shopping event this Friday, a lot of travel with my normal 9 to 5 job, and the holidays just around the corner, I thought I would get inspired vs. just being tired of the chaos.

So, I hopped into the kitchen to mix up a new hot chocolate recipe with a pint of egg nog I purchased from the grocery store. With the egg nog as my muse, I pulled out milk, vanilla, nutmeg, 99% unsweetened cacao from Scharffen Berger, Valrhona Cacao Powder and cane sugar from the refrigerator and/or pantry. First, I heated up the egg nog and milk in my double boiler over medium/low heat. Always make sure the bottom of the boiler is not actually touching the water. This helps avoid scorching the milk and/or chocolate shavings.

After warming up the nog, I added the chocolate shavings and blended continuously with a whisk. My goal was to have a creamy hot chocolate, but not due to the egg nog’s consistency. I wished the mixture to be creamy from the cocoa. Thus, I added a little Valrhona Cacao Powder to achieve the creamy richness I desired. Next, came ground nutmeg and vanilla.

Initially, I planned on adding cane sugar to the mixture. However, the sweetness from the egg nog was pleasant enough. After working out the cacao powder lumps and ensuring the chocolate shavings melted completely, the color and texture of the mixture deepened. Now, I am ready for a taste…not too bad!

I poured up a small cup for myself and the other half. After he took a sip, he said “This is good hon”. For an on the fly, holiday inspired venture, I think I created a recipe for the books.

Egg Nog Hot Chocolate from The Cocoa Lady of Cocoa Connoisseur

2/3 cup egg nog
1/3 cup milk
1 tbsp 99% cacao unsweetened baking bar, chopped
½ tbsp cacao powder
1/8 tsp ground nutmeg
½ tsp pure vanilla

Hot Chocolate Tastings at the Junior League Holiday Market

Over the past few days it has been exceptionally hectic in our household. We just wrapped up the Junior League’s Holiday Market held at The Woodlands Waterway Marriott. This was our first time participating in this holiday shopping event and it went very well. Our booth was extremely busy the entire event mostly due to our hot chocolate and marshmallow samplings. During the event we shared the following products with interested customers:

• Omanhene’s Hot Cocoa Mix from Ghana
• The King’s Cupboard Dark Chocolate Chunk Hot Chocolate from the USA
• Dufflet Extra Brut + Madagascar Vanilla from Canada
• Dufflet Mocha + Espresso from Canada
• Ghirardelli’s Peppermint Hot Chocolate Mix from the USA
• Mocafe Azteca D’Oro 1519 Mexican Spiced Ground Chocolate from the USA
• Vanilla Bean Marshmallows from Plush Puffs from the USA
• Dagoba Organic Xocoltal Hot Chocolate from the USA

Mom and Dad flew out as reinforcements for the 4-day event. This was my Dad’s first time setting up, viewing and participating in a tradeshow. He found it very chaotic and a lot of hard work. Previously, when my mom would return home from these events, he really never understood why she was so tired. Now with his first hand experience at tradeshows, he definitely understands the madness.

It was such a pleasure to see the faces of customers trying these hot chocolates for the first time. About 99% of them have never tried a true hot chocolate before. Especially after I would engage them about the product and they would ask “can you make it with water”. I just wanted to cringe when I hear that remark! The hot chocolates at the tasting booth are not made with “tri’s & di’s” or powdered milk. All of the samples were made with 2% milk and were extremely tasty. If they wished to tr

y a milk alterative, my mother would talk to the customer as she isn’t milk drinking person. Personally, as I have said before…”I am all about the cow.”

As the show wrapped up and we ran out of the King’s Cupboard Dark Chocolate Chunk, Mocafe Mexican Spice and Dagoba hot chocolate mixes. I even ran out of the Sugar Free Dark Chocolate Chunk! Normally, I do not bring sugar free mixes to the show since they never sell. However, we had a large contingency of people watching their sugar intake or had diabetes.

Initially, I planned on only sampling the Omanhene, Ghirardelli and The King’s Cupboard.

However, I became inspired by the reaction to the hot chocolates began sampling and opening up cans of Dufflet and Dagoba. The visitors have never tried anything remotely close to the sample selections and were extremely surprised at the kick of Dagoba’s Xocoltal chilies and cinnamon blend and Mocafe’s mildly spicy recipe. However, overwhelmingly the winner of the event was Omanhene’s Hot Cocoa Mix due to the chocolately flavor, simple recipe and perfect price point (6.50).

As we broke down the booth Sunday night, the chair of the Junior League came by my booth to re-introduce herself and the chair for the next year’s event. This year’s chair asked how the show was for me and noticed how consistently busy I was throughout the event. This was an honor since it was my first time being selected to participate in the event. Some of these shows are extremely difficult to get into. Hopefully, this means good news for 2009?

So, it get ready America! I am determined to educate people on the praises of drinking chocolate. Our next tradeshow is the Stonebridge Church Holiday Market in The Woodlands, Texas on November 22^nd.