Frozen Hot Chocolate

Before I get to this recipe, I wanted to say thank you.  Thank you so much for your comments I love hearing your thoughts, they inspire and encourage me.  Your compliments are so thoughtful and kind and really brighten my day.

I number of you have asked questions about the photos on our blog and I wanted to make sure to answer those.

99.9% of the photos on our blog are taken by one of us.  Usually that means I'm behind the camera, but if it is not I usually will let you know.  It is pretty rare that I will post an image from someplace else, but occasionally I do.  Again, I will let you know if I do.  Those images I "borrow" are usually photos of beauty products or some sort of graphic.  I did "design" the summer gatherings though.

All the photos we have taken up until about three weeks ago were with a point and shoot, which we loved.

Recently we purchased a Nikon D5100 and so far so good.  I'm trying to learning how to use this camera, so for me that means moving it off the auto button.  I'm not at manual yet, but hope to get there.

I really have no idea what I'm doing and I just shoot what looks good to me and sometimes I get lucky.

I don't style any of our food shots, for two reasons.  I want the recipes to look good, but also accessible to you.  I don't want it to like like it is from a magazine, but like something we just made in our kitchen, because that is what it is. Whatever I have posted is our dinner or dessert, so I don't have a lot of time to take photos. I usually take 3-5 shots and then ask Brian to pick which one he likes best and that's the one that gets posted.

That doesn't mean I don't like food styling.  I love looking through food magazines and your blogs that have gorgeous photos of the food you have prepared!

It's just for now, we have to keep things simple here.

So, thanks again for your sweet words they encourage me to keep practicing.

Now on to this recipe.  I saw it awhile back in the blog world and knew I wanted to make it.  Yum, right?  It is incredibly hot here right not so I thought it would be perfect.  Bri and I thought this was really good, but the kids didn't like it at all.  They thought it was too bitter.  So I'm giving you the recipe a little apprehensively.  There is some tweaking that I will be doing with this one, but I'm certainly not giving up.

Frozen Hot Chocolate

Here are some of my ideas that I would like to try.  Omit the butter, cut back on the cocoa or use a hot chocolate mix.  I would encourage to google frozen hot chocolate.  It was made famous by a restaurant in New York.  There are a number of recipes that will give you a place to start.  The consistency is perfect, I just need to tone done the bitterness. 

3 Tbs. granulated sugar

3 Tbs. dutch process cocoa

2 Tbs. unsalted butter

2/3 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips

1 1/2 cups of skim milk

Whip cream

chocolate chips

4 cups of ice cubes

Combine the sugar, cocoa, and butter in a double boiler over simmering water.  Stir until a smooth paste forms.  Add the chocolate chips and stir until melted.  Add 1/2 cup of milk and stir until combined.  Take off the double boiler and cool to room temperature.

Combine the chocolate mixture the remaining milk and half of the ice in a blender.  Blend until smooth and then add the remaining ice and blend again until smooth.  Top with whip cream and chocolate chips.  Enjoy!

xoxo

Rachel