This is the recipe my great grandma made and taught my grandma, who taught my mom and me. Every time we visited my grandparents or great grandma this cocoa was made for breakfast.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup of sugar

1/4 cup of cocoa powder

Dash of salt

1/3 cup hot water

4-6 cups milk

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 teaspoon burned sugar flavoring (optional)

Marshmallows

Directions:

In a large pot combine sugar, cocoa powder, salt and hot water. Mix until a paste forms.

Heat on low heat until the paste becomes a syrup, stirring often.

Slowly stir in milk and flavorings and continue to heat until desired temperature. DO NOT SCALD.

Add marshmallows and serve.

Notes:

I don't buy burned sugar flavoring, instead I heat the cocoa and sugar until it's sticky before adding water. This will cause the sugar to crystalize a bit when you add the water (even if it's boiling). Just keep stirring. Once you have a good syrup, add the milk as directed and keep stirring in any bits that may have stuck to the bottom or sides.

Just the sugar, cocoa powder, salt, and water makes homemade chocolate syrup! You can scale up the recipe if you'd like to keep some homemade chocolate syrup around for chocolate milk, ice cream, coffee, whatever you use it for.

If you have leftover, this makes the BEST chocolate milk I've ever had.

Here we go: Welcome (officially) to The Social Distance Kitchen! Lesson one is how to make pancakes from scratch if you can’t find the box mix you might normally use. Besides, if you can’t go out, you definitely have time for breakfast!