Healthy Home Made Hot Cocoa

I am loving this wintery weather! My favorite part is getting into the warm drinks and soups! YUM! I am pretty much a soup person all year round but it’s the best when it’s cold outside. I love the contrast between the chilly weather and being able to drink something nice and hot to warm up your entire body- there is nothing like it!

I have always been a huge fan of hot chocolate. In high school I drank it almost daily during the winter months. I am from northern Nevada and most people I talk to don’t realize that it snows up there. We lived 45 minutes from about 7 ski resorts, including Tahoe, one of the best places to snowboard. We used to get A TON of snow growing up. Snow days were my fave and we would go sledding as much as possible but my favorite memories are getting bundled up in our winter clothes and playing in our enormous backyard for hours, making snow angels, snow men and having snow ball fights.

Here’s a picture of when we were little. My husband calls this the hobo-children photo because I guess we look homeless? Haha, I didn’t think so until he said it but hey! This is how it was and I love it!

Ever since I was diagnosed with Gluten Intolerance, I started lowering my sugar intake and reducing the hard sugars I ate. Even now, I read more and more about how bad sugar is for you and my body can surely testify! I feel better and better each time I cut back. I try very hard to make healthy recipes for my family. It’s important to me to make sure my family is eating healthy, especially my little Kaden.

Earlier this year, while it was still cold at the end of last winter, we went through a huge hot chocolate phase. I was buying hot chocolate like crazy. I didn’t usually feel the best after drinking it but I drank it anyway. I tried reducing the amount of milk and diluting it with more water but It didn’t make much difference…

Until I made a major breakthrough. I LOVE dark chocolate so I tried Starbucks Dark Hot Chocolate and fell in love. When I was looking at the mixture in the packet, I saw mostly cocoa powder. Then it hit me. What if I made hot chocolate using cocoa powder and sweetened it with honey or maple syrup? Thus, Healthy Home Made Hot Cocoa was born. I’ve never gone back since.

All you need is:

Cocoa Powder
Milk (use dairy free if needed)
Pure Organic Maple Syrup
Water

Heat your water or milk (I like it really dark so I predominately use water and add a little milk. My husband loves it creamier so he warms up milk, it’s up to you!).
Add 1-3 scoops of cocoa powder and mix until well incorporated.
Add 1-3 Tbs of milk (or more if you desire it to be more creamy).
Sweeten with Maple syrup.
Add cinnamon, mint, pumpkin spice,a spoon full of coconut oil or whatever else you love in hot chocolate!
Top with whipped cream.

TIP: If you would like to be even healthier, sub whipped cream with coconut cream!

I make it differently every time! That’s what I love about hot chocolate 🙂 It can be so versatile. It just depends on what you’re feeling at the time!

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