Hot Chocolate - Ginger bread Spiced

Everyone out there, who are in my circle knows my love affair with this guy and I don't think I have to now officially publish this message. My obsession, my love Hot Chocolate! Chocolates were my love growing up too, nevertheless to mention, every kid would love chocolate. But I was never a person with sweet tooth, I loved all the savory things stuffed in the bakery slides and used to drool over it, because at my home my health guide Mom had a very big 'No' for bakery stuffs.

But lately I realized that my love for chocolate is not just an infatuation as a kid, but it is so real and when I say chocolate, it is not every chocolate out there. It is the purest, darkest chocolates with more than 70% cocoa in it. Some of my favorites being the Belgian made Godiva, Lindt bars and Lindors in dark chocolate flavor. I will munch over a 90% Lindt bar just like that and my friends called me crazy when they tasted and blamed me for spoiling their mouth :-| I don't have any rationale towards International brands, but it is so rare to find a dark chocolate in India. Bournville is one which I can get it here which claims to have 50% cocoa.

When talking about chocolates, more than the Chocolate, it is the Cocoa part in it I am interested in. All my baking recipes calls for the purest unsweetened Cocoa powder which gives you the deep, luscious flavor for which you can spoil yourself. Hersheys and Weikfield are my favorite unsweetened Cocoa brands, the ones I used till now and the best I experienced.

So coming back to hot chocolate drink, you would have seen there won't be any of my weekends without a pic of hot chocolate and me hugging each other, yeah I am so much in love. Even though there are many variations I prepared at home, I never had put my recipe over here. So today being a fine day to disclose our relationship and the request from one of my pals for the recipe, I started writing down about this guy.

So this ginger bread spices flavor is a hit at home and today when I took my first sip, I called my hubby and told him, "See I wish you were here, coz I cannot even explain how awesome stuff I have just made". Yes, it was so awesome and it ended with licking around the edges of my coffee mug. I started researching over hot chocolate flavors too, so you can get to see more of its kind soon. So here it goes the ginger bread spiced hot chocolate.

Ingredients:
Milk - 1 cup
Fresh cream - 2 tbsp
Unsweetened Cocoa powder - 1 tbsp
Jaggery powder - 2 tsp
Ginger powder - 1/4 tsp
Cinnamon powder - 1/4 tsp
Clove powder - 1/4 tsp
Nutmeg powder - 1/4 tsp
Dark chocolate slab, chopped - 1 tbsp + 1 tsp shavings for topping
Whipping cream - 1 tsp
Chocolate syrup - just a drizzle
A little heart - for my love :)

Method:
Heat all ingredients together, except Chocolate shavings, syrup, whipping cream and little hearts, until simmer. Pour the hot chocolate in your coffee mug.Pour the whipping cream and give a gentle stir at top. You can also whip the cream and pipe it. Now drizzle with chocolate sauce, then shavings, and the little heart to finish it off.

Dive into the divine :-*

Note : I powdered every spice at home rather than buying the powders. It is always recommended to do that to get the full flavor of any spice.

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