Though not strictly foraged, I need to share with you the joy of making our own hot chocolate (chocolatl) the way the Olmecs, Mayans and Aztecs prepared it for thousands of years.

We got these cacao beans from a plantation in Madagascar last summer.

The Aztecs regarded chocolatl as a sacred drink, fit only for warriors and nobles. Commoners were forbidden to drink it. It helped a warrior march for a whole day without food.

Well I measure up as middle class, so not sure where that places me, but what the heck, here goes.

I roasted the beans at 140C (Gas mark 1) for 5mins, then at 135C for 15mins, then 130C for 15mins. Roughly.

I winnowed the skin off them, then crumbled the bits into a pestle and mortar. I crushed them with this then put them through my hand mill too.

I used 1 cup boiling water over the powder, and stirred on a low heat for 5 mins.

I added 1 cup oat milk with vanilla seeds out of 2 pods…we (guess what) got these from Madagascar. I’m not going to lie and say I found it in an English hedgerow.

But we did find wild vanilla vine in Madagascar in the rainforest as well as see how it was grown and painstakingly prepared on Ambanja plantation.

For my son I only added honey and vanilla, but for mine i added 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper and 1/2 tsp mixed dessert spice (ginger, nutmeg, cloves).

The verdict…delicious. I used my sacred quaich cup that I have used ceremonially through the years. It seemed only fitting for this very special drink.

For more info, I recommend the excellent video by Blood & Spice below. There’s loads about the history of xocolatl and the different types.

Enjoy!

xx Hedgewitch Kat xx