My Favorite Hot Chocolates of 2018

Since starting this blog, I get asked all the time what my favorite hot chocolate is, or can I please recommend something to get as a gift for someone. Well, yes, yes I can recommend something! Whatever the occasion is that you need an amazing hot chocolate, I'm here to help! Below are my thoughts on some of my favorites and you can decide for yourself which might be the one you're looking for. They are not in any particular order, and I've included a variety of types and flavors, and I'll keep it short and sweet. You just cannot go wrong with the drinking chocolates I've included here! Enjoy!

Bean to Bar Drinking Chocolates

Askinosie Sipping Chocolate
Askinosie is one of my favorite chocolate makers, and I've reviewed their drinking chocolate before. It's a perfect example of what makes bean-to-bar chocolate amazing. Dark and rich, it's a wonderful introduction into the world of bean-to-bar drinking chocolates.

Mutari Craft Chocolate
Mutari only makes bean-to-bottle drinking chocolates, no bars. It's amazing, and if you get a set with a few flavors, you'll really enjoy the differences between them. Not overly sweet, it's perfect for a serious chocolate lover. And I think they may change their flavor offerings, so check back once in a while!

Dick Taylor Drinking Chocolate
Dick Taylor is an icon in the craft chocolate world, and their drinking chocolate is top notch. Before they even offered drinking chocolates for sale, I was making it from their bars. If you like your hot chocolate a little more on the tangy and very rich side, this is the one for you.



Potomac Chocolate
Potomac is my favorite chocolate maker. The whole company is just one guy, Ben, working out of his basement. The flavors he captures in his bars are just amazing, and he's carried that over wonderfully to his drinking chocolates. And the Spiced variety packs a bit of heat!

Gourmet Drinking Chocolates

MarieBelle Hot Chocolate
This is the hot chocolate that got me started on my adventures with chocolate. It was one of my very first posts here on Melting Mug, and is still one of my favorite hot chocolates out there. If you're buying this as a gift for someone, I'd recommend sticking with their original Aztec mix. This one is actually one of my favorites gifts to give during the holidays.

Jacques Torres Wicked Hot Chocolate
This spicy hot chocolate is from celebrity chef and world renown chocolatier Jacques Torres. When choosing a spicy hot chocolate for my list, I had a tough time deciding between this one and Chuao. Both are exceptional and have a fiery kick to them, and you can't go wrong with either. You can even get this Wicked Hot Chocolate as a cool gift set with mugs!

Chuao Spicy Maya Drinking Chocolate
Ok, so yeah, I have to include this one anyway. There's plenty of room on this list for two spicy hot chocolates. This was the first spicy drinking chocolate I ever tried, and it's wonderful. It finishes really hot, though, so if you like spicy things, this is your drink!

Powder Mix Hot Chocolates

Chocolat Moderne Kama Sutra
This mix absolutely blew me away the first time I tasted it, and it's still possibly the most relaxing chocolate drink I've ever enjoyed. It's a day at the spa in a can! The spice combination in the Kama Sutra mix is heavenly, and just smelling it will make you want to put on fluffy slippers and settle in next to the fireplace.

Lake Champlain Hot Chocolates
Lake Champlain's mixes are some of my favorites to keep at work, where I don't always have the time to melt solid chocolate in hot milk. Sadly, it doesn't look like they still make their Chai & Mighty flavor, but their other flavors are great, too.

Mexican Hot Chocolates

La Soledad Hot Chocolates
This is as authentic as you can get, so much so that your have to order it from Mexico. I'd advise grabbing either the almond (almondrado) or the cinnamon (canela). Package it up with a traditional molinillo for frothing the chocolate and you've got an amazing gift set! You can read my review of this drink here.

Taza Stone Ground Chocolate
Taza is made the same way traditional Mexican chocolate is, stone ground and organic. They're based in Somerville, MA, so a little bit easier to order than the La Soledad. Their sampler pack has an amazing variety, and each disc is perfectly sized for a mug of drinking chocolate!

Chocolate Syrup

Abuelita Chocolate Cinnamon Syrup
I know, I know - it's made by Nestlé. If you've read my blog before, you know I tend to stay away from the giant corporate chocolate makers. However, the ingredients here aren't packed with chemicals, and the flavor is a wonderful variation when reaching for a chocolate milk. I wouldn't have it on this list if I didn't love it.

Make your own!
A while back I posted a super simple recipe for making your own, and not only is it one of the tastiest I've had, you can use it on everything from hot and cold drinking chocolates to ice cream and pies. Check it out here, and keep in mind you can use your favorite cocoa powder to make it your own. Also, your friends will be thrilled that you made it yourself!

Marshmallows

Marshmallow Madness!
If you've never tried homemade marshmallows, oh wow, you NEED this book! Making marshmallows is easier than you might think, and so worth it. And again, it's one of those gifts that your friends and family will be amazed by. I mean, who gives out homemade marshmallows? you do, that's who!

Other Chocolate Things, Part One

Being obsessed with chocolate is awesome!

Everywhere I go, I'm on the lookout for new chocolates or chocolate things of any kind. I have a large, ever-changing pantry of artisan chocolate bars, and the different flavors and types of chocolates out there is amazing.

And then once in a while, I come across chocolate things that aren't chocolate bars. That's what this post is about. It's not hot chocolates, but if you like chocolate like I do, I think you'll find it interesting anyway. 

When I first became interested in how chocolate is made, I did what I usually do to learn about something - I bought a book. The New Taste of Chocolate: A Cultural & Natural History of Cacao with Recipes by Maricel E. Presilla is a great book, covering the history of cacao, how it's processed to become chocolate, and even some of the modern science of everything involved with cacao. It's filled with pictures, and in back there some recipes, including a couple for hot chocolate.

Chocolate music? Yep! Well, the music from the places where cacao is grown, which I guess is as close as you can get. Music from the Chocolate Lands was released by Putumayo, and it's really fun! Music from places like Belium, Peru, India, Mexico, and lots more. At first, it's just interesting to hear what popular music in these countries sounds like, but after a few listens, I was singing along (even in another language!) and had picked out my favorites. In fact, I liked the song Kakou by Dobet Gnahore so much, I bought one of her albums!

I found this chocolate milk by Cocoa Metro. When I bought it, I figured how different can it really be. Wow! This is so much better than regular convenient store chocolate milk! (I'm looking at you, Nestle Quik!)

This is dark chocolate milk. Really rich, amazingly good! And check out the ingredients. Nothing crazy, no weird chemicals, certainly no corn syrup. If you come across this stuff, buy it!

The elusive chocolate soda. I remember Faygo made a diet chocolate soda when I was a kid in the early 80's, but I haven't seen it since then. A couple years ago, I more or less gave up soda, but I made an exception for this.

Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory has stores all over Southern California, but I found this at a Sprouts grocery store near my apartment. Sprouts is a healthier, farmer's market type of store, so I was surprised to find this there.

I was hoping to find some real cocoa in the ingredients list, but alas, it wasn't meant to be. Ah well. It was an interesting flavor. Not delicious, definitely chocolaty, but strong. Maybe it was just a very artificial chocolate flavor, I don't know. It was interesting, but I wouldn't rush to get it again.

ChocoVine chocolate red wine. This is an odd combination I've seen everywhere lately, chocolate and red wine. There's a few other people out there making chocolate red wine, but this is the one I tried. I'm not a wine drinker, so I was hoping this would be pretty enjoyable, but to me, it just tasted an awful lot like Bailey's Irish Cream. My girlfriend wasn't much of a fan either. On their website, however, I came across some mixologist videos, which, I have to admit, look awesome!

Now this is good stuff! 41 Olive Dark Chocolate Balsamic Vinegar. This is delicious! When I bought it, I paired it with a chipotle olive oil, and wow, what a combination! Absolutely amazing to dip bread into. And I've cooked with it. I used the vinegar and seasoning on some fish, then pan fried it in the olive oil. Oh man. Seriously. Buy some. For real.

And finally, I found some cocoa-roasted almonds. These are great. Very crunchy, and I think there's some sugar used to bind the cocoa to the almond before roasting, because they're not bitter at all. Very chocolaty and nutty, a perfect snack, and pretty healthy too.

And that's it for this batch of other chocolate things. Have you found anything interesting made with chocolate out there? If so, please leave a comment so I can try it out! And if you've tried any of this stuff, let me know what you thought of it. I'm especially curious to know what wine drinkers think of the chocolate wine.

Welcome to Melting Mug!

Hello, and welcome to my blog all about hot chocolate!

Why did I want to make a blog about hot chocolate? I love chocolate in general, but I especially love to drink it! I’ve learned so much about hot chocolate recently, and I want to share what I’ve been learning. I also want to also be able to connect with other hot chocolate lovers and hear about your ideas and recipes.

I’ve always loved hot chocolate. Actually, I should say hot cocoa - there’s a difference. My entire life, I’d only ever had the packet mixes of hot cocoa. Swiss Miss, Nestle, the kinds found in every grocery store. Sometimes I would add things to the packet mix. I’d melt some chocolate chips or a candy cane in it. I’d make it with milk instead of water, I’d use two packets instead of one, or I’d add flavored coffee creamers into it. Anything to give those packets some extra kick. And it worked, I made some decent hot cocoas.

Then late last year, I learned that what we Americans call hot chocolate is actually hot cocoa, and in Europe and Mexico (and other places), they make REAL hot chocolate, using actual melted chocolate instead of a powder mix. It turns out those grocery store hot cocoas are mostly powdered milk.

This probably shouldn’t have been surprising to me, but it was.

So I tried some of the real stuff, with the melted chocolate. WOW! What a difference! It instantly changed everything I thought I loved about hot chocolate. Then I learned there were many, many different ways to create these amazing hot chocolates. Different kinds of chocolate, different sweeteners, different spices added in, even eggs! I felt like I had to try all of them!

When you try some of these recipes, you’ll see what I mean.

I’m still just getting started on the journey. I’ve had interest from friends, and I figure there’s even more interest out there in the world, so I’m starting this blog.

If you like hot chocolate, or have only ever had hot cocoa packet mixes, you’ve come to the right place! I’m going to be posting recipes and the results as I work my way through a few hot chocolate recipe books. I’ve also come up with quite a few of my own, and have ideas for many more. I’ll also be giving my thoughts on a lot of the better mixes out there, trying recipes from the internet, and who knows, maybe we’ll even visit those packet mixes once in a while and see what we can do with them.

Please make the recipes! Once you find what you like and don’t like, experiment, add in more things you like. See if you can come up with a flavor of hot chocolate that’s never been created before. Please post in the comments, share everything you try. Maybe together we’ll come up with the next best hot chocolate ever! Do you know of some awesome chocolate company that makes an amazing hot chocolate? Let me know and I’ll track it down.

That’s the mission statement. So let’s get on with it already!