Cocoa Tea Courage

Grated Cocoa Sticks

I'm back in the cold. Yippie. I'm just sooo excited!

No really, I am....Right.

All it took was 5 days in sweet sunny St Lucia for me to come back to Toronto and be instantly depressed by the cold.

But what better time of year is there to explore the wonders of your kitchen? There's something about a hot oven, lovely scents wafting out of the kitchen, mouth-watering creations emerging to tempt your taste buds and warm your heart. Come on! While preparing to face the cold and snow, there's nothing like some fresh baked bread and some homemade hot chocolate to give you the courage you need to step outside.

In St Lucia, our version of hot chocolate is Cocoa Tea. On a cool, rainy Sunday morning, nothing hits the spot quite like a steaming mug of cocoa tea. Now cocoa tea is not actually tea. It's more like really really dark chocolate blended into milk. This wonderful concoction begins as an innocent looking cocoa pod filled with seeds, progresses to a cigar looking cocoa stick, and ends in cocoa heaven!

The process of making the cocoa stick is a long and labour intensive one. It involves cracking the ripe cocoa pods to get the seeds, cleaning, drying, then roasting the seeds, breaking them into pieces, grinding them up in a mortar and pestle, and finally shaping them into a cocoa stick! Like I said, labour intensive. But don't worry....you can just buy one at the Castries market, or you can have a St Lucian friend favour you with one brought back from St Lucia. Your life will be a lot easier for it. If you are in St Lucia one day and you do get the chance to partake in some cocoa stick production, go for it. Your cocoa tea will taste that much sweeter for it. :)

So if you happen to have a cocoa stick just lying around, use the following recipe:

St Lucian Cocoa Tea
1/2 cup grated cocoa stick (or 1/4 cup cocoa powder)
2 cups water plus a little extra
1 cup milk (homogenized, evaporated, or low-fat)
Sugar to sweeten to taste
1 tsp vanilla
1 Bay leaf
1 tsp Cinnamon
a pinch of grated nutmeg
1 tbsp cornstarch

Put water to boil with cinnamon and bay leaf. Boil for about 15 minutes. Add grated cocoa to boiling water; boil for another 10 minutes. Add milk. Sweeten to taste. Mix the cornstarch with extra water to form a sort of semi-liquid, and slowly add to the boiling mixture, stirring all the time. Add vanilla. Strain and serve.

Try topping with whipped cream to kick it up a notch. :)

Mmmmm... I think I'll go have me some right now!
 
Ash :)