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Brandy Cocoa
3 tablespoons cocoa 1 1/2 cups boiling water 1/4 cup sugar 4 cups milk 3 teaspoons cooking brandy Prepare as Reception Cocoa, and add brandy before milling. Chocolate I 1 1/2 squares unsweetened chocolate Few grains salt 1/4 cup sugar 1 cup boiling water 3 cups milk Scald milk. Melt chocolate in small saucepan placed over hot water, add sugar, salt, and gradually boiling water; when smooth, place on range and boil five minutes; add to scalded milk, mill, and serve in chocolate cups with whipped cream. One and one-half ounces vanilla chocolate may be substituted for unsweetened chocolate; being sweetened, less sugar is required.
Two closely related drinks from the same page: a cocoa spiked with brandy, and a richer chocolate made from melted bar chocolate. Both depend on the same trick — cooking the cocoa or chocolate with water into a smooth paste before the milk goes in.
- MillingTo "mill" is to froth the drink with a wooden chocolate mill (molinillo), twirled between the palms. A whisk, an immersion blender or a milk frother does the same job; the aim is a light foam on top, not aeration of the whole pot.
- The hinge: cook the pasteIn the chocolate recipe the boiling water goes in gradually and the mixture is then boiled five minutes before it meets the scalded milk. The same paste-first approach is presumably what "Reception Cocoa" called for, though that recipe is not on this page. Cooking the paste helps disperse the cocoa solids so the drink is smooth rather than gritty.
- "Prepare as Reception Cocoa"The brandy cocoa refers back to an earlier cocoa recipe not reproduced here; on the usual pattern that would mean working the cocoa and sugar with the boiling water before combining with scalded milk. The recipe specifies only that the brandy goes in before milling.
- Cooking brandySimply inexpensive brandy kept for kitchen use rather than a distinct product; any drinkable brandy works. Three teaspoons in over five cups of liquid is a flavouring rather than a fortification.
- Scalding the milkBring it to about 180F, when the surface shivers and a ring of bubbles forms at the edge. Do not let it boil, which throws a skin and gives a cooked taste.
- Unsweetened chocolate squaresA square meant one ounce, so 1 1/2 squares is 1 1/2 oz of unsweetened baking chocolate. The suggested substitute, "vanilla chocolate," is what would now be sold as sweet or semisweet dark chocolate — cut the sugar to about 2 tablespoons if you use it.
- YieldThe chocolate makes about a quart; the brandy cocoa closer to five and a half cups. Served in small chocolate cups, the chocolate gives six to eight servings, the cocoa four to five mugs.