Divine

I had a cup of Cold Stone Creamery's dark chocolate hot chocolate, and want to report it is a definite thumbs up! Did I travel across town to stand in line and drool over ice cream and fixin's while waiting to order the hot chocolate? No I did not! I was given a box of the Cold Stone Creamery Smooth Cravings hot cocoa mix and simply mixed the contents of one packet with hot water. It was crazy good!

I like instant hot chocolate mixes, and enjoy the sugar free Swiss Miss version when I need a little sumpin' sumpin'. It's completely guilt free. I have even been known to use milk in place of the hot water on occasion, but the truth is, it is still a milk chocolate, watered down version of good hot chocolate. The Cold Stone Creamery brand has nailed my dark chocolate obsession with a mix that is even good mixed with water. I can only imagine how much I'll enjoy it when I try it with milk.

It isn't guilt free, but it's not horrible. It has 2.5g of saturated fat and 140 calories. When made with 2% milk, the fat probably doubles (I couldn't find my calculator so I'm making an educated guess on 6 oz.) and the calories increase to 220. It's not too awful for the fat/calorie conscious, but you couldn't sip it all day.

The packets get the sweetness just right. The full dark chocolate flavor is really good and rewarding. I have no idea what it cost because it was a gift, but I'm definitely going to check it out and keep some on hand for dark chocolate cravings.

What a great find right before the snow flies! Now all I need is a fire in the fireplace!

Oh yes, I also saw marshmallows the other day in a french vanilla flavor. Wouldn't a couple of those on top of the hot chocolate be ridiculous? Yum!