Hot Cocoa Top Tips from Annie Bell!

Perhaps the best investment in forward thinking while you have the stove lit is to whiz up a thermos of hot chocolate. It’s a hot water bottle in sweet nectar form, just a small cup, with a couple of teaspoons of dark rum in yours, biscuits all round and snuggle down. The easy route is one of those top-end hot chocolates, where all you need do is pour hot milk over the powder. But there is nothing quite as delicious as properly made cocoa, sipped hands wrapped around mug, sitting at the entrance of your tent as the light is finally fading. Although I suspect there is an entire generation coming on who have no idea how to make it, given how convenience wins over. If you are prepared to wash up the pan it wins hands down.

HOT COCOA 

For 1 person

The important thing with making cocoa is to cook it, otherwise it will taste powdery and raw. It also needs to be added to warm or hot liquid in order to blend. Place 1 heaped teaspoon of cocoa and 1½ teaspoons of sugar in a small saucepan, and add a few tablespoons of milk. Gently heat until the milk is warm, then blend in the cocoa using the back of a spoon. Add ½ a tin mug of milk and bring to a rolling boil.

Kit Stove, saucepan

REAL CHOCOLATE HOT CHOCOLATE

Another route that saves on having to take a tub of chocolate powder with you is to pour 1/2 a tin mug

of boiling milk over a row of dark chocolate squares in a mug or bowl – breaking this into small pieces FIrst. Leave it for a few minutes, then stir

vigorously to melt. Sweeten to taste, and you could scatter over a few mini marshmallows if you feel you haven’t had your fill around the campfire.

AND YOURS? I was going to suggest a couple of teaspoons of rum splashed in, but depending on the circumstances that may seem a little

conservative and something closer to neat spirit might be in order. Whisky is another good camping companion – in the interests of an uninterrupted

night’s sleep you can consider it medicinal.

Kit Stove, saucepan

BEST BISCUITS FOR DUNKING

Chocolate Digestives

Bourbons

Custard Creams

Hobnobs

Scottish Shortbread Fingers

*All of which go very well with rum and whisky too.

This is an extract from The Camping Cookbook by Annie Bell