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Composite Image by Michelle A. Hoyle based on Lin Pernille Photography’s attribution licensedphoto and Amarand Agasi’s attribution-noncommercial-sharealike licensed photo.
Image: Chocolate pudding with a candy cane.

I was inspired to try this out by following the trail of a LifeHacker blog post on making macaroni and cheese in a coffee mug to The Family Kitchen blog. My eye was caught by a side panel link to "Microwave Chocolate Peppermint Pudding in 5 Minutes!. I did store the URL away but then when I went to make it, I couldn’t be bothered to check my stash and came up with “Chocolate-Peppermint Pudding” at the FatFree Vegan Kitchen. My final recipe was an adaptation of the latter and took more than 5 minutes, but not much longer. The result is something that tastes an awful lot like After Eight mints! Note that this is gluten-free and can be vegan.

Time & Results

• Preparation time: 5 – 10 minutes
• Cooking time: 5 – 10 minutes
• Servings: 2

Ingredients

• 4 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 tablespoons cornstarch ([1])
• 250 ml (¼ cup) sugar [2]
• 375 ml (1 ½ cups) milk [3]
• 1.25 ml (quarter teaspoon) peppermint extract
• Peppermint sticks for garnish (optional)

Preparation

1. In a 1-litre (4-cup) microwavable bowl, blend the cocoa powder, cornstarch, and sugar together.
2. Slowly, while stirring well, mix in the milk. Stir until most of the cocoa powder seems blended in. Some may seem to remain but this will mix in during cooking.
3. Microwave on high power for 1 -minute, then stir well.
4. Repeatedly heat for 30 seconds and stir until the mixture boils, watching carefully to ensure it doesn’t boil over. The mixture will gradually thicken as it cooks.
5. When it boils, heat it for another 30 seconds, stopping the microwave if it threatens to boil over.
6. Add the peppermint extract, stir the pudding well, and ladle into 2 serving bowls.
7. Garnish with peppermint sticks, if desired.

Notes

1. Cornstarch is known as “cornflour” in the United Kingdom.  ↩

2. I used caster (raw) sugar, but regular white granulated sugar would be fine. FatFree Vegan Kitchen suggests you can halve the sugar and add 2 tablespoons of stevia or other sweetener instead.  ↩

3. To make this vegan, use fat-free soymilk, rice milk, or any other non-dairy milk.  ↩

Personal Notes

The FatFree Vegan Kitchen notes you can experiment with other flavours, like orange extract or even peanut butter, or even cook it on the stove. I didn’t try any of those variations. I did, however, put my pudding in the fridge to cool. The consistency later seemed a little rubbery. Perhaps I should have left it to cool to room temperature? Nevertheless, it was tasty!

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