I love hot chocolate and will happily drink it all year round. I tend to buy Cadbury Highlights or Options, whatever is cheaper at the time. I'm currently drinking Options Mint Madness which is selling in my local Tesco for £3.19 for a 220g jar or 2 for £5.00, this should give you 20 mugs of hot chocolate. Its also available in a single serving sachet for 32p or 4 for £1.00.

Options hot chocolate drinks are sold in a curvy plastic jars with a simple screw top lid which is a pale blue colour. The front of the jar has the Options logo along with the flavour, Mint Madness, written in green. The front of the jar also informs the customer that the drink is made from Belgian chocolate and contains just 38 calories per serving which is given as 11g or 3 teaspoons. The rest of the jar gives all the relevant information for the product such as nutritional values, ingredients and directions for use. These are all easy to read should you wish although the print is quite small.

When the jar is opened there is a silver paper seal across the top to keep the powder fresh, this breaks easily and once opened the Options powder smells sweet and chocolaty but surprisingly not very minty. The powder is fine and is a brown colour, I always have a quick taste of the powder before I make my drink and it tasted like it smelt, sweet and chocolaty and still not very minty.

Directions for use
Options give the directions for use as adding slightly cooled boiled water to 3 teaspoons of the powder and stir well, if you prefer your chocolate drink a little creamier add a dash of milk too. Now personally I find 3 teaspoons of powder too much and generally use 2, this is just my preference and I do tend to like my drinks a bit on the weak side, also I never feel the need to add milk as I think the drink is lovely and creamy without it. I also always add a dash of cold water too, this just makes it a drinkable temperature right away.

Once made up the mint madness Options is lovely, the chocolate flavour is rich and sweet and now the mint really comes through, its a lovely combination. I love having my hot chocolate mid afternoon, its a great pick me up and stops me picking at things I shouldn't before dinner. Its great at filling a gap and with much less calories than a chocolate bar or heading for the biscuits.

I often use Options hot chocolate powder in cooking too, sometimes I add it to butter icing to make chocolate topping or just sprinkle it over ice cream. I also sometimes add it to hot custard to make chocolate custard, my Mum used to do this when I was little, as a diabetic it meant that I could have chocolate things the same as everyone else, she used to do the same with porridge too.

I would certainly recommend Options Mint Madness hot chocolate drink, it makes a lovely chocolate drink anytime of day and is low in calories too. Of course if you are not counting calories there's nothing stopping you adding a big dollop of cream and chocolate sticks to it for a nice evening treat. Either way its delicious.