Chocolate Tea

Chocolate tea is so delicious, it may lure you to your doom. This, at least, is the theme of a Barbadian folk song about a man so beguiled by his lover’s chocolate tea, he doesn’t realize she’s actually poisoning him. While the double entendre of the song is debatable, what isn’t up for debate is that this hot, slightly bitter Caribbean cocoa drink is seductive indeed.

Made by grating cocoa balls or sticks into a mixture of milk and water, then boiling, chocolate tea is spiked with spices such as nutmeg, cinnamon, ginger, and even bay leaf before being sweetened with condensed milk. The spices used vary depending on the cook and island, and coconut milk is sometimes also substituted for the condensed milk.

The real star of the show, however, is the cocoa. Pure, unsweetened, and minimally processed, locally-grown cocoa adds a richness and intensity to cocoa tea that is missing from more processed hot chocolates. To make the cocoa balls or sticks, producers grind cocoa beans combined with spices, commonly nutmeg and cinnamon, then shape them into their final form. While it’s harder to find these cocoa balls outside of the Caribbean, those eager to try authentic chocolate tea can check Caribbean grocery stores or order the cocoa online. (Whatever you do, just don’t use hot chocolate mix.)

Once prepared, chocolate tea is perfect for dunking (or soaking) bread and biscuits. It’s also a great accompaniment to a classic Caribbean breakfast of bake and saltfish buljol. In St. Lucia, people traditionally make a one-pot meal of it by boiling small flour dumplings directly in the chocolate tea.

And since you’re definitely wondering: No, there are no actual tea leaves in chocolate tea. In the Caribbean, any hot beverage had with breakfast is called a tea. The name can be used for more savory concoctions as well, such as fish tea, which is believed to be an aphrodisiac. Combine that with chocolate tea’s folkloric potential to serve as a vehicle for poison, and it seems that all is indeed fair in love and tea.