A combination Willy Wonka would never have thought of that warms you up a treat after playing in the snow! It’s liquid perfection!

The chocolate milk itself is about as basic as it gets – lots of melted dark chocolate and warm milk. It’s the bold pink peppercorn and cinnamon-infused syrup that takes it to the next level.

This scrummy recipe, which originally appeared in Issue 2 of The Simple Things, comes to you from the Kayotic Kitchen blog – its mastermind, Kay, calls herself ‘the cooking Dutch girl’ (she has the wooden shoes to prove it!) and says, “It’s is all about having fun with food and my camera”.

Hot Chocolate with pink peppercorns

Makes 2 generous mugs

• 200g dark chocolate (you really don’t want milk chocolate for this)
  1 pint milk
• 
1⁄2 cinnamon stick
• 
100ml water
• 3 tbsp sugar
• Pink peppercorns

1. Technically, pink peppercorns are impostors – they’re not peppercorns at all, they’re berries. Use as much or as little as you like. 1 tsp, lightly crushed, will give some zing.

2. Put the crushed peppercorns into a saucepan and add water and sugar.
 Break a cinnamon stick in half and add it to the water. Bring it to a boil. Simmer it over low heat for about five minutes, until it transforms into a thick, amber-colored syrup. Sieve the syrup.

3. Break the dark chocolate into small pieces and heat it in a bain-marie or very carefully in the microwave. Heat the milk too, then stir into the melted chocolate. It works best to just let it be for a while, 15–30 minutes or so, and then reheat it. The chocolate milk will be more chocolatey and velvety this way.

4. Add as much, or as little, of the pink peppercorn syrup to the hot chocolate as you like. It really adds pizzazz.

We found that Kay’s spicy treat is lovely to drink while you’re playing a few rounds of a traditional card game with your loved ones. You can check out two of our favourite card games here.

Have a sneaky peek at our Wishing For A Snow Day feature in Issue 5 below (if you’re on an iPad/iPhone click here):

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