Chili-lime hot chocolate

Breakfast: Apple, pear, blackberry, almond milk and cinnamon smoothie

Lunch: Miso noodle soup with mushrooms (and some carrot cake from the delicious Dufflet)

Dinner: A very much uninspired vegetable strifry followed by home-made chili-lime hot chocolate

Sometimes, it's the simple things you make that impress people the most. I've spent days searching for obscure* ingredients followed by hours cooking to put together a fantastic set of Thai meals to have them rated as "okay" (Dad), only to have people gush for weeks about a set of cupcakes that took me about an hour to make. This was definitely the case when I asked my ridiculous friend David, sat in the kitchen of our Sydney Green House, whether he wanted some home-made hot chocolate. His eyes lit up and he almost pooped his otherwise incredibly healthy pants at the thought of molten chocolate whisked into a frenzy. He was equally stoked with the results, although we're talking about a man who once drank 3 banana milkshakes at brunch, so don't take his word for it.

Hot chocolate will always get you in someone's good books, and it really is shockingly easy to make. The main issue is not burning the milk, as anyone who's ever made Bird's custard the proper way will tell you. As long as you have a heavy-bottomed pan and keep it over a low heat, stirring often, you won't have a problem.

Thanks for this recipe also have to go to the fittest-mom-with-a-child-under-1 in the GTA, Liz McBeth, for first gushing about chocolate tasting with me and then suggesting the lime addition when I said "oooh, chili hot chocolate would be good....". She was not wrong!

You'll need:
(Serves 2)

2 mugs of milk - I recommend cow's milk, but I'm sure almond or soy would also work fine. Rice milk is probably a bit thin (and crap)
50g milk / dark chocolate, grated
1 small red chili
The grated zest (outside) of 2 limes
1-2 tsp honey

Method:

Put the milk in a heavy-bottomed pan.
Slice the chili down each side with a thin knife, but don't separate the 2 sides at the bottom
Put the chili and lime zest into the milk and warm it gently for 10 minutes, stirring often
Sieve the milk to get the chili and the lime bits out
Put the milk back into the pan and stir in the grate chocolate
Increase the heat and add the honey
After 5 more minutes, if all the chocolate is melted and the mixture has thickened, take it off the heat and whisk it like a madman
Pour into the 2 separate mugs, keeping the foam from falling in with a spoon
Top with the foam and a sprinkling of cinnamon if you're feeling generous

I made this last week, on a fairly warm weekend, but in the middle of winter this will be amazing, especially if you've just come in from the cold and your jeans are wet and your face is freezing. Throw on some warm jammies, dry your hair and make this. I recommend watching Spaced while you're drinking it too, but that's neither here nor there.

I would comment on the nutritional value of this drink, but there is none. I kid - but honestly, some things are there to be treats, and this is one of them.

*Well, obscure in Yorkshire, but then again last time I went home I asked a bloke in Tesco whether they sold tofu and he asked me if it was a vegetable.

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