Quick Creamy Chocolate Pudding

If we have a family dessert it's this quick chocolate pudding. When we were first married, back in the olden days, we were living on love. I was supporting us as a portrait photographer and suffice it to say, love was about all we had. Thankfully to newlyweds, that's about all you need. Anyway, we both liked to end our day with a little sweet treat and this pudding became a several times a week little sweet treat. Like the title suggests, it's quick, creamy and chocolate. What more could you want? One of my favorite memories of this dessert is the time our good friend was over and for lack of options, I whipped (whisked?) up a batch and served it forth. He looked at it blankly and asked what it was. Uhhh, chocolate pudding. "But it's warm", he protested. "Why is it warm?" I informed him that I had just finished cooking it. The poor guy didn't know that you cooked pudding. Apparently he had only had instant pudding his whole entire life! Again, poor guy!

Please notice the cup pictured above, it was given to me by a friend's mother and I love it. I can only eat pudding out of this cup. However, I only have two so everyone else has to eat their pudding out of something else. Tough darts, that's the way it goes around here, especially when the mom is a dish fanatic and has to eat certain things out of certain dishes. I'm weird but I have accepted it.

Quick Creamy Chocolate Pudding

2 Tablespoons cocoa

3 Tablespoons sugar, adjust if you like it less or more sweet. You can substitute honey.

2 1/2 Tablespoons cornstarch

Pinch of salt

2 cups of milk, any kind will work. Whole milk is yummy but 1% is fine too.

1 Tablespoon unsalted butter, leave this out for a low-fat dessert

Whisk cocoa, sugar and cornstarch in a medium saucepan, slowly pour in milk and cook over medium heat. Whisk every few minutes but don't whisk constantly. Overcooking and overwhisking are two things that will cause a cornstarch pudding to break down and turn into liquid instead of thick luscious creaminess. Not a good thing! So you are whisking slowly and as the pudding thickens, more steadily to prevent lumps. After a few minutes the mixture should begin to thicken and begin to boil. Turn off the heat and stir in butter. When the butter is mixed in, take it off the burner and pour into cups or bowls. If you want to serve it later, press a piece of waxed paper on the surface of the pudding to prevent it from forming a thick nasty "skin". You can also prepare this in the microwave but be sure you are using a large bowl and stirring every 30 seconds or it will boil over faster than a New York minute and then you'll have a mess. Shoot, now I want some chocolate pudding, can you eat pudding at 11:00 in the morning?