Mexico grew and harvested cacao centuries before a European ever got their hands on chocolate. So, not surprisingly, Mexicans (Central Americans and South Americans, as well) know a lot more about chocolate and ways to use it than us humble Scotch American farmers. So, when we heard tell of this drink that combined two things we love—chocolate and corn—and knew we had to try it.

Holy moly. Is this stuff good? Ostensibly it’s hot chocolate, but it’s so thick and creamy that drinking a small cup makes you feel like you’ve eaten a small meal. In fact, if you let it cool, it becomes the consistency of chocolate pudding. . . which makes us want to make it in summer and refrigerate it for dessert, too.

If you’ve only ever had hot chocolate made from a packet of powder, you have GOT to make this. It’s life altering.

Ingredients:

¼ cup Fine Ground Cornmeal, sifted
2 cups Water
½ cup Milk
3 oz Dark Chocolate, broken into pieces
3 Tablespoons Dark Brown Sugar (or piloncillo, if you can find it)
1 tsp Ground Cinnamon or ¼ tsp Cayenne Pepper**
1 tsp Salt***

Directions

Sift the cornmeal through a fine mesh sieve, discarding the remnants. In a saucepan over medium-high heat, add the cornmeal and whisk constantly while pouring in the water in a thin, steady stream. This will help avoid lumpy cornmeal.

Add in the milk, chocolate, dark brown sugar, cinnamon or cayenne, and salt and whisk until all the chocolate has fully melted and is incorporated, about 1 minute.

Simmer on a low heat for about 5 minutes, continuing to whisk and scraping down the sides so that the chocolate mixture does not burn on the sides of the saucepan. The mixture will thicken slightly as it cooks. Don’t walk away! Cornmeal and chocolate are both just the types of ingredients that can scorch quickly if the heat is too high or if it is not well stirred.   

Adjust the consistency to your preference by adding as much water as you’d like to create a drinkable, yet thick, consistency. Taste and adjust to your liking! Add more sugar if you like a sweeter hot chocolate, give it an extra boost of cinnamon or cayenne pepper, or even melt in more chocolate pieces for an even richer chocolate taste. Don’t be afraid to experiment! (a dollop of peanut butter anyone?)

Use an immersion blender or food blender to process. Take the extra time to do this quick step. It will make the drink creamy, ensure that there are no accidental clumps of cornmeal or brown sugar, and will add a bit of frothiness to the drink. 

Notes:

*Every recipe we have found uses masa instead of corn meal. A few even say that it’s impossible to use corn meal to make this drink. We experimented and found that very finely ground corn meal—essentially the “flour” consistency corn meal we sieved out of our usual fine ground corn meal—worked just as well with negligible difference in taste.

**Spice additions are suggestions. They are traditional additions, but you have to add them a bit as you go and figure out what you like. Some on the team here would love 1/4 tsp of cayenne in this drink—but that would burn some of our faces off, too. So, season this according to what your tongue likes and can bear.

***Salt is a magical ingredient when using chocolate. It may seem unusual since the idea here is to create a sweet rather than savory drink, but salt has a wonderful ability to make the chocolate flavor pop without making the final product taste salty

• We used 80% dark chocolate, feel free to use whatever chocolate you most enjoy!

• If you’d like to cut out the milk entirely and use only water, or use a non-dairy alternative, that’s no problem! 

• For you dairy lovers out there, it might be tempting to think you could replace all of the water in this recipe with milk for an even richer, creamier drink. Who’s gonna stop you?! But truly, we found that the thickness provided by the cornmeal and the use of dark chocolate creates such a rich drink already that it felt there was no need to add any extra dairy.

• When this cools, it will actually set-up and become like a pudding. You can also enjoy it this way, too. Or to reheat, simply warm on the stovetop or in the microwave to make it smooth and drinkable again.