The Good: Tastes good, Inexpensive for the quality
The Bad: Inaccurate serving size on package, Preparation is not as easy as it could be, Not at all nutritious.
The Basics: Maud Borup Peppermint Drinking Chocolateis good and worth the added effort one needs to make it up right!
Having been reunited with my wife – we spent the summer apart for work reasons – part of the joy of discovery has absolutely been us gifting things to one another that we picked up during our separation. In my case, that means my wife has been giving me all sorts of things she knows I will want to review! Tonight, that takes the form of Maud Borup Peppermint Drinking Chocolate, which she picked up on clearance locally. I am enjoying sharing this with her and while she seems to be delighting in it even more than I (a rare thing for anything chocolate mint!), I have to say, it was worth the effort of cooking up a pot!
Like a lot of premium hot chocolates, Maud Borup Peppermint Drinking Chocolate requires milk to make it into a hot beverage that is anything worth having. This is not a hot cocoa that dissolves in water. As a result, and because of my insistence on not using a microwave for milk for cocoa, Maud Borup Peppermint Drinking Chocolate requires a lot of extra preparation time, though the time is worth it!
Basics
The Peppermint Drinking Chocolatemix is part of the Maud Borup premium hot cocoa line. The mix comes in an 8 oz. cardboard and plastic envelope. Each container claims to have six servings, but measuring it out precisely from both packages my wife bought us, I came out with four servings each time! For a single mug of cocoa, this is expensive when compared to other make-at-home products, especially when one factors in the additional cost of the milk. For a premium cocoa, the $2.50 for four cups is more than reasonable.
Ease Of Preparation
The Maud Borup Peppermint Drinking Chocolate mix requires a bit of extra effort to make. A single serving is three Tablespoons added to one cup of milk. Measuring out the powder is easy enough, however, this cocoa has actual tiny chocolate chips in it! Making sure one balances the powder and chips can be a hassle, so I have taken to making pots with all four cups and a single package of the Peppermint Drinking Chocolate!
The Peppermint Drinking Chocolate is best prepared using a whisk in a metal saucepan or pot over a low heat. It takes about fifteen minutes to make a two-serving pot, which is what I did for most of my batches simply because a single cup was too little to bother with. This is a lot of work compared to simply boiling water and mixing it with hot cocoa powder. As it heats up, stir constantly or the chocolate chips will stick to the bottom of the pot and burn.
Taste
The aroma of Maud Borup's Peppermint Drinking Chocolate is only slightly minty. The scent is a light peppermint, mostly chocolate bouquet. What I will say about the scent is that it caused an instant unconscious desire in me to consume the beverage; when writing my reviews, I am usually quite diligent about not tasting the review sample until after I have written all about the scent that foreshadows the taste. In the case of the Peppermint Drinking Chocolate, however, I smelled, considered, and immediately consumed, so this triggered something very primal in my desire center to make the scent overcome my training!
The taste of Maud Borup's Peppermint Drinking Chocolate is firmly that of chocolate mint, with the balance tipped more toward the side of chocolate than the mint. The chocolate flavor is dry and strong, much like a cocoa made from baker’s chocolate or a cocoa made with a hint of coffee in it. But almost as soon as the dry, forceful flavor of the chocolate washes over the tongue, the consumer is greeted by the much sweeter, slightly chilly peppermint flavor that is laced under the surface of every sip. This blends in the mouth to make a delightful flavor experience that truly represents both of the claimed flavors.
Maud Borup’s Peppermint Drinking Chocolate has a very dry aftertaste.
Nutrition
Maud Borup Peppermint Drinking Chocolate mix is hot cocoa mix and therefore not the most nutritious thing in the world, though having actual milk in the beverage makes it a bit more nutritious. Surprisingly, this cocoa has nothing in it that is not easily identified, including the emulsifier! The primary ingredients are chocolate, sugar, and cocoa. Given that it has to be mixed with milk, it is not vegan compliant. It also contains a dietary note indicating this has soy ingredients. It is not marked Kosher.
Obviously, this product is high in sugars. In each cup of Peppermint Drinking Chocolate, there are 180 calories, fifty of which are from fat. There are three and a half grams of saturated fat and if one uses skim milk, there is no additional fat! While there is no cholesterol or sodium, a consumer gets 8% of their recommended daily allowance of dietary fiber out of a single serving of this beverage! There is a little protein, but not enough to live off this. In other words, this product is not a nutritious food product.
This product contains soy lecithin and is not marked as gluten-free.
Storage/Cleanup
So long as one leaves the Maud Borup Peppermint Drinking Chocolate powder sealed in the envelope in the package, it ought to stay usable. There was no expiration date on my package of Peppermint Drinking Chocolate. The multi-serving package, for those of us who consider the environmental impact of such things, is mediocre on the environmental responsibility, but is still better than the single-serving packets most cocoas have!
Cleanup is very easy as well. If the product spills while dumping it into the mug, simply wipe it up or brush it up with a dry or damp cloth. If it has already been reconstituted with milk into hot cocoa, simply wipe it up. Light fabrics are likely to stain if this gets on them, in which case consult your fabric care guide to clean it up.
Overall
Maud Borup Peppermint Drinking Chocolate is quite good and makes the inexpensive cocoa worth picking up to please small groups of people with a warm, delightful, very chocolatey drink!
For other hot chocolate drinks, please visit my reviews of:
Land O' Lakes Chocolate Graham hot cocoa
Butterfinger Hot Cocoa
Ghirardelli Chocolate Mocha Hot Cocoa
6.5/10
For other food or drink reviews, please visit my index page by clicking here!
© 2012 W.L. Swarts. May not be reprinted without permission.
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