TCL LIVE | Winter is Coming ... Can Hot Chocolate Be Far Behind?

By TheChocolateWire | a year ago | 6 min read

Original photo by Nathan Dumlao / Unsplash.

Episode 141 of #TheChocolateLifeLIVE goes LIVE at 10:00 AM PDT / 1:00 PM EDT on Fri, October 20th.

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Episode Overview

In this episode (141) of TheChocolateLifeLIVE we will be exploring the outer limits of hot chocolate, chocolat chaud, chocolate quente, chocolate caliente, heiße schokolade, cioccolata calda, tiakarete wera, kaakao, warme chocolademelk, even heitt súkkulaði. By whatever name it is called in whatever language, one of the most regal beverages in the history of, well, beverages.

I apologize, but I couldn’t resist making the George RR Martin / GoT reference. One wonders (if chocolate could be a thing in Westeros), how Cersei Lannister might have preferred her hot chocolate. Bitter, I imagine, and colored with achiote to resemble to color of blood. Is that just me? If you have some other ideas, let me know in the comments!

There are several inspirations for this topic, this week. One is that I started to see adverts for Christmas in my YouTube feed. (Really? Before Halloween?) The second is that I am heading to London in a couple of days and I am planning a hot chocolate crawl. The long-range forecast calls for a 50% chance of rain and the high temp in the mid-50sF (14C). In other words, perfect hot chocolate weather.

My first-ever encounter with real French hot chocolate was in June 1998. I had traveled to Voiron, France to visit Stéphane Bonnat before my career in chocolate got off the ground. I was welcomed with open arms and ... hot chocolate in the Salon de Thé which forms an important part of the shop on the Cours Senzoan.

Many things made that hot chocolate special.

Before that morning, the extent of my contact with the beverage would have been hot cocoa; either a packet of mix or a syrup in warmed-up milk. Sugar-forward would be a polite way of describing the flavor profile. I can remember hiking with my dad and grade and middle school buddies in the Sierras and drinking hot cocoa of “Sierra Cups” in the morning because we were too young to drink coffee.

Questions to consider in advance of the livestream:

What’s YOUR favorite hot chocolate? How is it presented? What made it special? (Mexican/Aztec style? Kuna style?)
What is/was your favorite hot chocolate destination? Paris? (Angelina? Café de Flor? JP Hevin? La Charlotte de l’Isle?) Brussels? Köln? Amsterdam? Chicago? Turin? (Gerla! – and don’t miss a Bicerin or the Porta Palazzo market.)
Marshmallows? Yes? No? Size? Torched?
Whipped cream?
Cheese? (common in Colombia)
Flavorings? Mint? Caramel? (Or is anything other than plain is sacrilege.)

I have a fun family hot chocolate story about Paris that invludes the Harry Potter franchise, Angelina & La Charlotte de l’Isle, and Renée Fleming dating back to 2004. Tune into the livestream to find out what the connection is.

As always, I will be taking your comments and answering your questions during the livestream. So – tune in, learn, and share!

Links & Other Resources

Do you have a favorite YT video you think should be on this list? Let us know in the comments.

Planning a London Hot Chocolate Crawl
Options Abound!

The locations in SoHo and Firtzrovia are now under new management as Italian Bear and the departing owners say they cannot guarantee the quality of the products being served. Said Dal (Roma).

Notes From the Livestream

I did more than a little fanboying of the chocolates made by Heinde & Verre (Rotterdam, The Netherlands). In particular, I mentioned a bar they made for my 20th Anniversary tasting — endemic Dutch hazelnuts and a DOP sugar called basterdsuiker (which contains inverted sugar). Basterdsuiker, when used in a chocolate recipe, softens the bite and melt of the chocolate (in a good way) as well as imparts a different sweetness from straight beet sugar. Basterdsuiker is widely used in baked goods where it contributes to a sensation of moistness.

Component spices in speculaas/speculoos:

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Cardamom is a spice made from the seeds of several plants in the genera Elettaria and Amomum in the family Zingiberaceae. Both genera are native to the Indian subcontinent and Indonesia.
— Source: Wikipedia

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Cinnamon is native to Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Burma, and the Malabar Coast of India. Records indicate that Egypt imported the spice as early as 2,000 BC. Through the spice trade, it was eventually introduced to Mediterranean countries, with a Greek account dating back to the 7th century BC. By the Middle Ages, Europe was buying cinnamon and traders kept its source secret.
— Source: WorldAtlas.com

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Cloves are the aromatic flower buds of a tree in the family Myrtaceae, Syzygium aromaticum. They are native to the Maluku Islands, or Moluccas, in Indonesia.
— Source: Wikipedia

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Coriander is native to regions spanning from Southern Europe and Northern Africa to Southwestern Asia.
— Source: Wikipedia

In many English-speaking countries, coriander refers to the seeds and cilantro refers to the fresh greens.

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Ginger is in the family Zingiberaceae, which also includes turmeric (Curcuma longa), cardamom (Elettaria cardamomum), and galangal. Ginger originated in Maritime Southeast Asia and was likely domesticated first by the Austronesian peoples. It was transported with them throughout the Indo-Pacific during the Austronesian expansion (c. 5,000 BP), reaching as far as Hawaii. Ginger is one of the first spices to have been exported from Asia, arriving in Europe with the spice trade, and was used by ancient Greeks and Romans.
— Source: Wikipedia

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Nutmeg – the most important commercial species is the common, true, or fragrant nutmeg, M. fragrans (Myristicaceae), native to the Moluccas (or Spice Islands) of Indonesia. It is also cultivated in Malaysia, in the Caribbean (especially in Grenada), and in Kerala, a state formerly known as Malabar in ancient writings as the hub of spice trading, in southern India.
— Source: Wikipedia

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Pepper (piper nigrum) is native to the Malabar Coast of India, and the Malabar pepper is extensively cultivated there and in other tropical regions. White pepper consists solely of the seed of the ripe fruit of the plant, with the thin darker-coloured skin (flesh) of the fruit removed.
— Source: Wikipedia

What are YOUR secrets for hot chocolate success?

Some of mine are:

1) Don’t skimp on the amount of chocolate.
2) Don’t skimp on the quality of chocolate.
3) Don’t be afraid to experiment.

Please share yours in the comments.

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