Chocolate Chip Shakes

If you were to ask Alyssa what her favorite beverage is, I'm betting a million to one that she would answer Starbucks' Double Chocolaty Chip Frappuccino. Actually, she refers to it as "frozen hot chocolate," so you'd win that bet on a technicality. As the days have gotten hotter and hotter, she requests "girl time" visits to Starbucks with a frequency that may eventually land me on our local Starbucks VIP list, if such a list exists.

When I spoke to her on the phone this week, she requested a trip this weekend, as she generally does. As a home cook, I was surprised to find myself offering for the very first time to learn to make them for her instead. Duh.

By the way, I would never feed this already-climbing-the-walls eight year old a coffee drink. This is a cream-based Frappuccino that wires her up enough with its unapologetic chocolaty-ness.

You will need:

1 cup of milk

2 tablespoons of sugar

1/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips
3 tablespoons chocolate syrup
2 cups of ice
1/8 tsp vanilla
 
I found this to work perfectly and even managed to blend it well with an immersion (hand) blender, since our standard upright blender broke a few months back. Feel free to experiment and play around with the proportions until it's just right. This gave us 3 juice-glass sized servings.
 
Prefer your Frap with some whipped cream? You'll need:

1 cup heavy cream, very cold
2-3 tablespoons sugar

Beat, beat, beat, until stiff, about 4 minutes. Plop by the spoonful atop the shakes and drizzle with chocolate syrup, if you can handle more chocolate.

Please an eight year old today.

Or a thirty year old.