About a week ago I found myself absolutely craving a Garbanzo Grill burger and Jon’s amazing home brewed kombucha tea. Unfortunately, this little gem of a food stop is on the other side of the country from me.

Jon is in the process of preparing to ship his burgers, which will be a start. (Although it’ll never be quite the same as nibbling on one under that big old oak(?) tree.) But I can get kombucha down at the health food store and….

Nah, still not the same. So I decided to try my hand at it. With a little help from my friends, I found several online how-tos, went to Cliftonatty and got myself a nice big bottle of live culture tea, and am starting a SCOBY. Here’s a photo of what it looks like after 5 days, with a little added sweet tea.

Last night I made the Chocolate Sauce recipe I found here. I love to make syrups, flavored and otherwise, and thought this would be a wonderful replacement for the HFCS loaded stuff that comes in a plastic squeeze bottle.

½ cup cocoa powder
1 cup water
2 cups sugar
⅛ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon vanilla

Mix the cocoa powder and the water in a saucepan. Heat and stir to dissolve the cocoa. Add the sugar, and stir to dissolve. Boil for 3 minutes over medium heat. Be careful not to let it get too hot and boil over! Add the salt and the vanilla. Let cool. Pour into a clean glass jar, and store in the refrigerator. Keeps for several months, but trust me it will be gone before then. Yields two cups.

From: Amy Dacyczyn’s The Complete Tightwad Gazette

Tried it today, drizzled over my favorite additive free coffee ice cream. As George Takei would say, “Ohhhh Myyyyy!”