Opinion: Cold weather means hot chocolate

Leading up to Saturday, I heard the worst fears of friends, acquaintances and coworkers.

“How are we going to handle all of this snow? This is going to be a disaster.” My general feeling was yes, we’ve gotta be prepared for everything, but we have to see if the forecast even comes true. And if there’s a ton of snow, I guess I’ll drive to work slower.

But this morning? Not a flake as far as I could see.

And to this lack of snow, what did previously-aggrieved people say? They were mad because they apparently wanted snow all along. One friend wanted enough to cancel his work day. Another person was mad he didn’t get snow, but he did get cold.

In fairness, one person was positive — the reporter who suddenly didn’t have a weather story to write for Sunday.

I understand not liking the cold, but I try to find the silver lining in things. And the best silver lining when it’s cold weather is hot chocolate.

There are things I’ve grown out of, from Saturday morning cartoons to enjoying Ramen noodles. But I’ll never get sick of hot chocolate until the day I die.

We probably should have seen this coming when I was a youngster, drinking my family out of house and home. I’d usually get home from the bus stop and have a cup, and probably another before bedtime. That teapot whistle went off at least twice a day every December at the Wilson household.

I went through enough cocoa that my mom actually looked up a recipe for our own instant cocoa, because paying $5 for sugar, cocoa powder and dried milk made more sense than paying three to five times that for the packets.

I’d always make sure I kept a few dollars in high school for our Friday football games, even if it meant buying less for lunch. I wasn’t too big a fan of our team, knowing we weren’t among the state contenders, but I was a fan of the concession stand hot chocolate.

But 5-year-old Kevin and 17-year-old Kevin didn’t have a consistent paycheck. Current Kevin does, and he can buy cocoa any way he sees fit. Hello, coffee shop with 30 flavors of syrup. Let’s see how many I can get through before winter ends. My favorites are mint, raspberry and toasted marshmallow ... but don’t sleep on butterscotch.

Will it burn my mouth? It will destroy it? Will I get mad? Only if my burned tongue can no longer taste the chocolate.

Do you not have a gift idea for me this Christmas? Might I suggest those hot cocoa gift sets you see everywhere? And I’m totally fine if you wait until Dec. 27 to give them to me, because they’re half off Dec. 26 and you can get one for yourself.

The only hot cocoa I still want to try is the Flanders hot cocoa from “The Simpsons Movie.” The ingredients kept piling on for comic effect. Cocoa. Whipped cream. Chocolate shavings. Graham cracker. Marshmallow. Blow torch to perfectly toast the marshmallow.

My gift list now includes the following: Cocoa gift set, blow torch. Gotta be prepared for anything.

Kevin Wilson is editor of The Eastern New Mexico News. Contact him at:

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