Recipe Round-up (Hot Drinks)
The past few months have been difficult. We’ve been traveling in Mexico, exploring incredible places and a wonderful culture, but it has been hard to want to create or to participate in social media. I’ve struggled with the strange juxtaposition of living in such beauty, and at the same time being awash in the injustices back home. I just haven’t felt like I had much to say — at least not about food or travel. But, as paralyzing as it has been for me creatively, I do still feel the need to create things. And we all do still need to eat. The beautiful things in the world (delicious food included) are something that we can always hang onto.
This is all maybe a bit over the top (I mean, this post is about hot chocolate and horchata lattes), but really I’m just trying to share where I’ve been. I’m trying to find my voice again in what feels like a very rapidly changing world. Suddenly peddling recipes and travel photos feels a bit cheap.
I have some ideas about that, but those warrant a longer forum. We’ll get there eventually. For now, here are some recipes for hot drinks. They feel dumb and pointless in the current climate, but I guess that’s okay — because they also taste really good.
A quick recipe for infusing your morning latte with the flavors of your favorite breakfast cereal. I used cinnamon cereal for the recipe, and it is delicious, but you could use whatever you like — fruity cereal, chocolatey cereal, whatever — and it’d taste great.
These little orbs goodness are a bit of work upfront, but the result is magic. You make your own chocolate spheres and fill them with hot cocoa mix, warm spices, and mini marshmallows. Drop one into a mug of hot milk and voila, you have a steaming mug of rich hot chocolate.
Hot chocolate recipes often rely on ingredients like milk or cream to achieve that perfect silky texture, but not so here. With the right ingredients (all of which are easy to find), you can whip yourself up a batch of the creamiest, most luscious hot chocolate you’ve ever had — all without an ounce of dairy.
Mexican-style horchata mixed with hot espresso may just be as good as coffee gets. Sweet, creamy, ricey, cinnamon-infused goodness is perfectly balanced with a couple shots of bitter espresso. Top it with whipped cream and a dusting of cinnamon, and you have a drink that could be your morning coffee or an exquisite dessert. Whether you drink it hot or iced, this is one you don’t want to miss.