Last year, before I went to bed, I would heat whole organic milk on the stove and add about a tablespoon of raw cacao powder.  I would whisk them together until the mixture became hot cacao. 

When I started making this for myself, I would add a tablespoon of turbinado sugar.

I changed that to a half a tablespoon or more of dark maple syrup.  I love the dark dark (used to be) Grade B maple syrup.

I also used a tablespoon or less of honey.  About every two years, we buy a gallon of local honey at the State Fair.  We still have plenty left yet…so far.

I let go of the sweetener entirely.

For a while, I would throw in a handful of mini marshmallows into the cup and would pour the hot cacao over them.

Then, I dropped it to just the milk and the cacao.

I would drink one cup at bedtime to help me relax and to help me sleep better.

I have trouble falling asleep.  Once asleep, I have trouble staying asleep.  Both have always been issues for me.  It’s nothing new.

Some time during December last year, one night it came time for me to cook the cacao in the milk…and the exhaustion swept through me … I put the milk in the cup…and warmed the milk in the microwave. 

One minute in.  Stir.  One minute in.  Stir.  Let cool a tiny bit.  Drink.

It tastes better to me if it only the milk.  It is somehow sweeter with nothing in it at all versus when I used the sugar, or maple syrup, or honey—except on those times when I accidentally added way too much sweetener.  Although this didn’t happen too often, it happened often enough that I worried about doing it and purposefully watched to not repeat it.

So, warm milk.  My comforting ritual at night before bed.

What’s yours?  Do you have any nightly rituals you do? 

Let me know in the comments below.