Dessert/ Recipes

Sweet, Simple, Seriously Chocolate Pudding

Sometimes you just need things to be easy and uncomplicated. To cap off a long week, you want something familiar. Something simple and delicious. That’s what this chocolate pudding is, just simple. No parfait treatments or graham cracker crusts or whipped cream dollops here — just good ol’ pudding. Where the box variety suggests chocolate flavor, this pudding doesn’t skimp. It’s sweet, simple, and seriously chocolatey without being too rich.

As a kid who grew up on the box variety, homemade is a real step up. My dad always insisted on the “Cook and Serve” variety — no instant in our house. For no more work or time than you’d spend on a box mix, you can whisk together a batch of pudding and have it chilling in the fridge. What might surprise you is, this version is dairy-free.

You’ve seen Pacific Foods’ Hazelnut Chocolate milk here before in Nutella Fudgesicles, but the aim this time isn’t a Nutella pudding. We’re going all out chocolate. Using the Hazelnut Chocolate milk as its base, the pudding amps up its chocolate flavor with Hershey’s Special Dark cocoa and a bit of instant espresso powder. The Special Dark cocoa is a mix of Dutch-processed and natural cocoa, so if you’ve only got one in your cupboard, go Dutch-processed.

Given my “Cook and Serve” roots, I’m a fan of pudding skin, but if you like a strictly creamy pudding, you’ll need to press plastic wrap against the surface of the pudding before putting it in the fridge.

Have a great weekend!

Print Recipe

Chocolate Bomb Pudding

Serves: 4

Cooking Time: 9 minutes

Ingredients

¼ c. Hershey’s Special Dark cocoa
1/3 c. sugar
3 T. cornstarch
1 t. instant espresso powder
¼ t. salt
2 c. Pacific Foods Hazelnut Chocolate milk
1 t. vanilla extract

Instructions

In a medium sauce pan, whisk together cocoa, sugar, cornstarch, espresso powder and salt, breaking up lumps as much as possible. Over medium heat, whisk in the hazelnut chocolate milk and vanilla extract.

Continue whisking until the mixture just begins to boil, sending up a few bubbles at a time, about 4 minutes. Cook for 1 more minute. Remove from the heat and divide among 4 custard cups. Chill for 1-2 hours until cold.