The Ultimate Hot Chocolate is all about your favorite blend of flavors. This demonstration shows you just how easy and fast it is to make REAL hot chocolate in your own home. Get away from the crappy packets, enjoy the richness!
Prep, Cook, Servings
Prep: 30 seconds
Cook: 3-5 min
Servings: 1
Ingredients
4 oz milk (or soy milk, almond milk, oat milk, etc.. Can also do 2oz half n half + 2oz of water.)
2 oz chocolate Use a blend of different types of chocolate including cocoa powders, chocolate chips, chocolate bars from sweet to semi-sweet to dark chocolates up to 90% dark. The blend is wholly up to your tastes. Can also add mint chocolate, caramel chocolate, nutella, peanut butter and all manner of flavors.
1 Tbsp water
1 tsp of sugar (optional, add more or less to taste. Can also use agave, honey and other sweeteners)
Spices (optional to suit your tastes) Vanilla, Coffee Extract, Cinnamon, Cayenne Pepper, Chili Pepper, Almond, etc...)
Liqueur or other alcohol (optional)
Instructions
Place 1/2 inch to 1 inch of water into the bottom of a double boiler. Place on the stove at medium-high heat.
Add the top of the double boiler and add the 1 Tbsp water to the double boiler.
Measure out 1.5 to 2 oz of chocolate on a scale and add to the double boiler. Add any additional ingredients or spices.
Add 4 oz of milk to a microwave-safe mug and microwave for 40 to 50 seconds to get the milk hot, but not boiling.
When the water starts to boil in the bottom of the double boiler turn down to medium-low.
As the chocolate melts, whisk to combine all the ingredients.
When the chocolate is fully melted, add the hot milk and whisk together.
If adding alcohol, add about 1 Tbsp to the hot chocolate.
When everything is blended through, turn off the heat and serve in a mug.
Video Transcript. Apologies for any typos.
0:00
It's cold outside, and it's nasty. So it's a great day to make some hot chocolate.
0:14
Really good hot chocolate. I mean really good hot chocolate does not take that much more time than the stupid packages and boiling water and whatever. And you know, we were in Savannah a few years ago, and we found this book, Hot Chocolate by Fred Thompson. Simple little book, and a lot of great recipes in here. And what I discovered Oh, Nun's Revenge Fabulous Hot Chocolate. Oh my gosh.
0:43
And what I learned from this is that the basic ratio that I like, and that we like, it's essentially two ounces of chocolate to four ounces of milk, or a combination milk water, or various other liquids, eggnog and whatnot. But we'll talk about that in a second. So that's basically it. Two ounces of chocolate, four ounces of milk. And the types of chocolates that you use really depends up to you, and it will change the flavors and a mix of chocolates makes an even better hot chocolate.
1:15
So let's talk chocolate first. So first of all, for cocoa powder. I love this. I think this is Guittard. This is 100% unsweetened chocolate. So this is like the real deal. It's kind of like you know, some people do Hershey's too. I like the Guittard more. So this is going to be really, really strong, rich. You probably only want to use a little bit of this in your hot chocolate unless you really really want to go super dark. I've got your you know, unsweetened chips here, but these are some chocolates from an advent calendar. We just had not the best chocolate in the world but good. A mix of chocolate HEB is a local grocer here in Texas I got Lindt, I got Ghiradelli. And you know, the higher the number, the less sweet it is. So this is 85% This is 90% and then this is a sea salt chocolate Yeah, salt and chocolate. It's really good. It helped enhance the chocolate flavor. There's a recipe actually came out of here with the Ghiradelli fudge caramel squares. Oh my gosh, so good. Hershey's Kisses, you know light or dark work. Trader Joe's has a pound plus of chocolate that you can just break up and use this is amazing. So you know the idea just to mix and match chocolate. So what I'm going to do today, I'm going to add some of these Andies candies you know the the mint, I'm going to make a mint hot chocolate today what I'm going to do so those are even good.
2:38
Now beyond that, you know there is Nutella. And this is the HEB grocers version of Nutella. So a hazelnut spread makes an amazing hot chocolate. Of course you got Hershey syrup. Peanut butter, you can put some peanut butter in there peanut butter and chocolate it goes great together. Yes, you can even do it in hot chocolate.
2:55
Spices. So I got a little vanilla. I've got a coffee extract. Sometimes I'll even make a shot of espresso I'll put that in there. Of course cinnamon, maybe some cayenne or some chili pepper, you know, you want to put a little heat in there. You can even put a little bit of hot sauce in it if you want to heat. Salt is really good. I put salt in all of my hot chocolates now it helps to enhance the chocolate flavor.
3:17
If you don't want to use sugar you know you've got honey, you've got agave other sweeteners out there. Of course, milk is the classic This is HEB milk. But you know if you're non dairy or you don't want to use milk, you know I've got coconut almond milk here you got almond milk, soy milk, all of those, those all work as well. And I've even used half and half. Usually what I'll do is like two ounces of half and half and two ounces of water. And it actually worked really, really well.
3:44
Now the other thing that you're going to want, especially when you're first starting out, I recommend the scale, a little digital scale so that you can find out well what exactly is two ounces of chocolate. Cause two ounces of chocolate changes a little bit depending on the type of chocolate you're using like two ounces of powder is a lot more chocolate than say two ounces of you know the chips or two ounces of this. So until you get used to what two ounces looks like. You might want to go ahead and use some sort of a digital scale.
4:10
Now for the tools, you're going to want to have some sort of a double boiler. So this is a pot that's got about a half inch of water in it. And this is an actual double boiler that sits on top so we can make the hot chocolate right here. Now you can also just use something as simple as a steel bowl, just drop the steel bowl on there. So if you don't have a true double boiler, make sure you've got a steel bottom bowl and just put it right there and then you can make your hot chocolate right in there. And then last but not least, you want to have a whisk. So let's make the hot chocolate.
4:36
Now to show you just how fast and easy this is. We're going to do it in real time, no editing. So watch how fast is it here. Come on over here. Let's take a look at the scale first. Alright, this is my handy dandy little scale here.
4:46
So I'm going to put in a few few of the chips. Let's see that half an ounce, almost an ounce right there. I got to open up my powder. I'm going to take a little bit of this cocoa powder. There we go that's in there. That is almost an ounce. Now, here is our Andies mint so we'll put that one in there, we're not even to an ounce yet. I'm going to put a second Andies mint. Di do doot doo.
5:14
A second, Andies mint. I've got some dark chocolate in there got chocolate chip, I've got dark cocoa powder. And I'm going to add one of these little chocolates from the Advent, I'm still only at an ounce and a half. So I'll put some more chips in there. 1.7 1.8. I'll go with 1.8 ounces today. All right, there's our chocolate.
5:34
Come on over. All right, let's get this stood up. Look at this. All right, so what I'm gonna do is I'm going to add a little bit of water. In fact, you know what I'm going to turn the light on, so you can see it a little bit better. There we go. lights on, come on over.
5:52
There, ya go turn the heat on, we're gonna put the heat on nice and high to start to boil up underneath there. So I've got just a touch of water in there, I'm going to go ahead and just dump my chocolate right in there and look at the cute little penguin. And just 1 2 3 shakes of salt. That's just regular salt.
6:11
Now, while that's getting hot, okay, so what I'm going to do now is we're going to add some milk to a cup. Now I said about four ounces of milk. So I already know that this cup is about four ounces.
6:26
So let's just go ahead and get this. While this is going on, we are getting the we're getting the heat running. So there you go. So for about four ounces right there. And this is going to go into the microwave. Oh, look at that my light's in the way. So you guys don't have to deal with a light when you're doing it. So you'll be able to do it faster. All right, I'm gonna put that on for 50 seconds, five oh, 50 seconds, we want the we want the milk nice and hot. Because you don't want to put cold milk in with the with the double boiler. Otherwise, you know, bad things will happen. You just don't really want that.
7:05
So this is starting to get hot. Let's take a look over here. Come on over here. Doing this all in real time. I'm probably running a clock underneath this too. So see we got the heat on right there, it's coming up. So you don't want the heat right on the chocolate because it could spoil the chocolate and make it you know, not good. You always want to have indirect heat on the chocolate.
7:28
So again, I've got cocoa powder in here, we've got some chips in here, I've got Andies chocolate to give it the mint. This is some milk chocolate from an advent calendar thingy that we had. And that's just sitting in there. And this is 1.8 ounces of chocolate. Hmm.
7:45
Our microwave is done. Get the milk out. So now the milk is hot. It's not boiling or anything. I know that on our microwave that about 50 seconds is as hot as I want it to be as I attempt to get the light back in the place. There we go. Voila.
8:02
All right, what's happening down here. So you starting to get hot down here. You can already see that chocolate is starting to melt coming together. And I decided not to put any other spices in this particular hot chocolate just because I have the I have the Andies mint in there. Make sure you're getting a good view of this. I'm gonna move this over just a little bit. There we go.
8:28
Oh, yeah. How's that looking that's looking really good. Are ya watching that clock down there. This should take about I don't know, three, maybe four minutes to do, which is we have to get your package of chocolate out and then you've got to you know, get it hot, get water hot and all that. Look at that. See that's almost boiling already.
8:49
So once that is getting to about that stage, I'm going to go ahead and turn the heat down to about medium because it doesn't have to go crazy. You can see how beautiful this chocolate is getting. Oh, it smells so good. Again, YouTube, smell o vision we need to get smell o vision going. Ah so beautiful. So beautiful.
9:08
So folks, this is real hot chocolate. It's so simple. Now if you have kids, you may have to put some sugar. You notice I did not add any sugar to this whatsoever, because there's plenty of sugar in the mint. And then there's going to be a little bit of sugar in that milk chocolate one that I threw in there to offset the richness of the dark chocolate. Obviously the darker the chocolate, you know, the higher that number, the less sweet is going to be. So this is you know, a somewhat rich and probably considered bitter chocolate here. Now if you have kids, you're probably going to use more milk chocolate. You might even put a teaspoon or so a sugar.
9:46
Okay, now that the chocolate looks like this, I'm just gonna go ahead and dump the milk right in. Again, it's nice and hot so the chocolate doesn't suddenly just harden up or anything and I'm just gonna whisk it in.
10:02
Oh man, the mint smells great. Now that the milk is in there, all we're doing is just heating this up now. The milk is already nice and hot.
10:19
But yeah, if you have kids, you're gonna have to experiment. And you know, you might need to make it a little bit sweeter for them. I like a nice, rich dark chocolate. Alright, that's looking good. Feels nice and hot.
10:34
Let's move the camera back. All right. All right, so maybe you can see me maybe you can't but Oh, and we're crooked too. Sorry about that. All right, so we've got hot chocolate. I am not left handed. But here we go. Look at that. So we can stop the clock however long that just took. We can stop the clock on that.
10:57
I know you're still a little crooked there but so that was it. That was a mint hot chocolate that I just made. Oh so pretty. Right? So pretty here. I'm gonna grab look at that. Is that not pretty? Or is that not pretty? Oh, yeah.
11:17
Oh, so good. So good. I like I like rich dark chocolate. So very dark chocolate with basically a hint of mint. Even though I put the two Andies candies in there basically has a hint of mint.
11:30
So again, we were influenced by this particular book, I highly recommend that you all go get it if you want to learn to make really good hot chocolate in the home. You can see some of these pictures on the back is crazy.
11:41
And that took however much time you just saw on the bottom literally. We haven't done any editing of this. You just saw that all in real time. So hey, if you'd like that recipe or you like what we're doing here Where's Walter Please subscribe. I got recipes on here we got travel advice. We've got drinks make a lot of cocktails. Oh, that's the one thing I forgot Hold on.
12:01
Now you wouldn't do this with the kids. But you know for adults. Oh nice praline liqueur you know you got Bailey's you got all kinds of things that you could slip into this thing. You know? I don't know how pralines and mint taste. But you know, let's see.
12:20
Ooh. I feel like buddy the elf. Ooh. Let's see what happens.
12:31
That works. That works. So yeah, for for you adults out there. You can add a little splash of a liqueur in there. But hey, thanks so much for watching. Please subscribe, and stay with us for more recipes and travel tips and all kinds of other other weird stuff.
12:46
Happy drinking