A school of fish: Hot Chocolate through the ages

We learned, of course, about the ways the Aztec and Maya used cacao to make hot chocolate. There are various recipes for "Aztec hot chocolate" online and most of them are probably too spicy for us. And the more authentic they are, probably the less we would like them…but we did want to at least try a little of that bitter chocolatl-style drink.

I had some cocoa nibs (which is just raw cacao bean, crushed a little) so we tried eating those, both roasted and unroasted, to see what they tasted like. We added some of the nibs to our blender with chili powder, cinnamon, vanilla, and water to make our chocolatl. (Which, by the way, we learned means "bitter water." Very apt.)

We poured it back and forth between vessels to make it foamy, like the Maya are shown doing in some old pictures. (See also here)

It's pretty interesting how grainy those cacao nibs are, no matter what you do to them. We pulverized them in our powerful blender, which you'd think would grind them way more finely than a mortar and pestle ever could, but they still don't just dissolve. And the drink just keeps an oily film on top too. (Emulsifiers help with this, as we learned later.) All the way through the early European days of drinking chocolate in the 1500s and 1600s, through Revolutionary War times and even later, drinking chocolate would have been a little grainy and oily like this. It's the conching [or melanging] process, where it is ground and mixed for three days or whatever it is, which finally makes the chocolate smooth and silky. And aren't we all glad it does?

For purposes of demonstration and because we didn't want to end this activity with a bitter taste in our mouths (ha ha), we skipped a few centuries and made Parisian hot chocolate for a little tea (chocolate) party. We always appreciate a chance to use Nana's pretty tea set!

It's traditional for the eldest daughter to pour, is it not?

Though I don't know if the eldest daughter should have a chocolate mustache.

(I think our tea party last time was nicer. But this one was fun too. And if you want the hot chocolate recipe, it's at this link!)

On another day, we learned about different types of modern (dare I say avant-garde, even?) hot chocolate! We split into teams to make some different kinds. We did have a recipe book but most people just took "inspiration" from it rather than real recipes. Daisy and Gus made…I can't remember, something with vanilla bean, cloves, and milk chocolate, I think. Daisy always comes up with great hot chocolate creations. She prides herself on it (justly).