Mexican Hot Chocolate Fudge

My mom makes the best fudge in the world. She makes it by the bucketload every Christmas and gives it away as the most delicious DIY gift.

But Mom sticks to a recipe, and that recipe yields 4 types of fudge: chocolate, white chocolate, chocolate with nuts and white chocolate with nuts.

A couple years ago I tried to make some fudge of my own. And since I'm such a creative spirit *cough cough* and can't follow a recipe to save my life, I totally ruined it. As the St. Louis Cooking Examiner, I wanted to be different; I added orange zest and cranberries to the white chocolate fudge. My roommate and I resorted to eating the fudge — weirdly soft and gooey — out of the pan with spoons.


Well, I learned my lesson. Except I'm still bending the rules a little. At least this time I'm not even trying to use Mom's recipe … so maybe the food gods turned a blind eye to my wayfaring ways.

This fudge actually turned out great! The hints of cinnamon and cayenne made the chocolate slightly spicy and warm. I caramelized the sweetened condensed milk, giving the fudge a caramel-y background as well.

Even Mom approved.

Ingredients
1 14-oz can sweetened condensed milk
1 12-oz bag semisweet chocolate
4 tbsp butter
4 tbsp brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
pinch of salt

Procedure

1. Melt the butter and sugar together in a saucepan until they create a luscious-looking sauce. Add in the spices and the vanilla. 
2. Scrape in the condensed milk and let it simmer for 10 minutes, stirring constantly. You really have to babysit it, otherwise the sugar will burn (I've learned this the hard way growing up making fudge).
3. When the mixture has gotten glossy and thick and very light caramel-colored, turn off the heat and add in the chocolate. Stir to melt the chocolate completely.
4. Pour the fudge into a very well greased, foil-lined baking dish. The size of the baking dish depends on how thick you want your slab of fudge to be: I'd recommend the typical 8x8 baking pan. Let the fudge cool completely before turning it out on a board and cutting into squares.

Sweet, spicy, chocolatey. Heaven.

-Katie