French Vanilla Hot Chocolate
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There are many important mysteries of life, a few come to mind such as the origin of pink lemonade when there are no pink lemons. Or how'd they get the brown out of chocolate for that white chocolate stuff. These things greatly trouble me you know. Beverages come to mind at this time because of my cup of French Vanilla hot chocolate which is sitting next to the computer monitor. As always I glance at the directions and as always I am made most cranky by the instructions to put hot water in the powder. It cranks me out because you know, hot chocolate requires hot milk, not hot water. I ignor the instructions on how to heat up the water and instead carefully put my mug of milk in the microwave and watch for the first moments of bubbly action that tells me I have a scant few seconds to turn the microwave off and retrieve the mug before half of the milk foams over. That's part of the ritual of making hot chocolate. Granted, it's not as ritualistic or as historically meaningful as a Japanese Tea Ceremony but it's something that recalls times gone by when making hot chocolate wasn't as easy as it is now and it recalls when it was something a bit more magical. So I will always use milk in my hot chocolate, even when hot water is called for. I'll pour my milk into a cup and place it in the microwave while I recall putting milk into a small pan and trying to not scald it, usually failing and remembering the ritual of scrubbing out the scalded milk from the pot. The scalded milk a reminder that nothing good comes without effort and a bit of hard work, even if it's after the hot chocolate is sitting nicely in my belly.