Death by Chocolate

At the hotel in Auckland they asked on the first morning if I wanted coffee with breakfast?
I don't do coffee so asked for a hot chocolate instead. They were happy to oblige and it was all part of the breakfast price...I was liking this even more.

The hot chocolate arrived and it was out of this world.
This picture shows you the white chocolate one I had the next day...

It was served on a plate with 2 squares of fresh made marshmallow and a little dish of cream!
I only found out the next day that they did 3 types, milk, dark or white chocolate.
They were all made using pure chocolate! None of this powder or syrup type of hot chocolate...oh no....nice little disks of chocolate.
I decided to treat myself to one in the afternoon and when I asked for it they asked what flavour I wanted. I enquired further and that is when she showed me the disks of chocolate that they used to make it.
No wonder it was a sweet as it was. That is why I had a white chocolate one the next day. The milk chocolate one was devine but I do love white hot chocolates, especially if made with real chocolate.

The marshmallow was devine and complemented the sweet chocolate so well as it wasn't actually sweet at all. I never tried the cream as my head would not let me think further than drinking it, as I would hate to know the calories in it, sure it didn't go well with Weight Watchers!

Also, even thought I managed a milk one at breakfast and in the afternoon of the first day and then a white one at breakfast on the 2nd day, it is a good job I didn't have anymore as at $6.50 a go I think I would have either been broke or twice the weight before the visit was over! The ones with breakfast however were part of the food cost, so lucky there.

However, if I ever need a treat again when in Auckland I definitely know where to visit!

Finally Complained

I am not a coffee drinker! Just can't stand the smell or taste. It has its advantages meaning that I am never desperately in need of a coffee fix etc.
Therefore when at a cafe with friends I will go for a hot chocolate.
However I feel that we get a really bum deal as the cafes never seem to understand that we do like a drink with flavour not just a glass or cup of hot milk.

The presentation is always beautiful, nice chocolate colour to the milk, gorgeous white froth sitting on the top with a scattering of chocolate sprinkled over and finally 2 big fat juicy marshmallows on the side.

Give it a stir, mix it all together, get that breath taking first sip of milky froth with the sprinkle of chocolate and it tastes divine, take your 2nd mouthful of the complete drink and then realise that you are drinking hot milk that looks like it has been shown the chocolate!

I have always wanted to complain, take it back usually with the simple comment of "Could I have some chocolate in this please?"

Finally today I stood my ground and I did just that.......and it felt great.
They apologized and said they would make me a new drink, I was expecting them to add a little more powder and give it back to me, but a new one arrived. Now it wasn't fabulous but it was definitely better than before. The colour of the milk was a lovely dark colour and the froth was still so creamy but at least it tasted like chocolate and not hot milk.

So if you are fussy like I am, then get strong and bold and take it back, get what you asked for.
Unfortunately it will be a long battle as most of the staff in the cafes drink coffee and so therefore never actually taste their hot chocolates to see where they could improve they just continue to chuck out hot milk with colouring at their customers!

The Missing Drink?

Steve drinks Pepsi Max and I have been very good too and stopped drinking Coke and drink the Max when I want something like that.
Although I was beginning to wonder whether Steve was guzzling down a bottle a day as we seemed to go through it quite quickly.
After hanging some washing on the line in the garden I came in to find the following sight and to finally discover where all the Pepsi had been going!

What is he doing in the fridge?

Drinking Pepsi!Now I know where it has been going!

Consequently now another thing we have to watch Alex closely for. No more drinking Pepsi!

After daycare

Little rituals are what sometimes keeps this family flowing right.

Ben and Alex always love having a drink as soon as they get in the car from Daycare, so we utilised an old baby bag we had and it is now the drinks bag.

Every morning we do bottles of drink for them and then we put them in the insulated bag and the drinks then sit in the car all day whilst we are at work, until we pick them up.

We came up with the bag as the drinks were getting hot sitting in the sun all day long!

This way they don't get too hot and if they do leak for any reason it just messes up the bag and not the car.

So before the car can leave Daycare, we have to get out the drinks, you would think they hadn't had a drink all day sometimes.