Growing up in Guadalajara, I remember drinking lots of Champurrado. We mostly bought it from food carts while out on the town during the holidays (Fiestas De Octubre, Dia De Los Muertos, Posadas, Navidad and Año Nuevo). It warmed us right up and went perfectly with the warm buñuelos, churros, crepas and donitas that we used to buy. I wish I had photos to share with you of these beautiful memories but I hardly have any from my childhood all together.

It’s almost impossible to find a good champurrado here in the United States so I’ve learned to make my own. Let me tell you what champurrado is…..

Champurrado is pretty much a rich and thick hot chocolate beverage that is made with tortilla flour (masa – harina de maiz), cinnamon and bittersweet Mexican chocolate.

I recently met the Ninja team at IFBC and had the opportunity to try out their new Nutri Ninja Blender Duo with Auto-iQ.

My boys were stoked when I opened the box because they absolutely LOVE smoothies and helping me out in the kitchen.

I was stoked too because it came with a fabulous recipe book, a 24 and 32 ounce serving cups with lids, and two blades.

   

The cookbook is awesome. It has all kinds of recipes!

 

With my boys screaming in the background, I had to immediately put it to good use and make them a nutritious smoothie for breakfast.

Nothing fancy, just our usual morning smoothies with orange juice, Greek yogurt, strawberries, banana and kale/spinach with ice.

The powerful blades shaved the ice in no time. I’m thinking I’ll be making lots of frozen drinky drinks 😉 for our big friends and raspados for our little friends this upcoming Summer.

   

I love that I didn’t have to take off the strawberry stems because the blender took care of those right away. The drink was as smooth as a juice!

All I had to press was the power button and the”Frozen Drinks Smoothie” button and let it take care of business. It was on for a total of 1.5 minutes. It pulsated every 5 seconds at first to make sure it gave it’s contents enough time to fall down and get blended well. I LOVED not having to sit there and push down the kale or move the ice around with a spatula like i did with my old blender because it would be stuck on top or bottom.

The 5Auto-iQ programs are pretty cool. They combine unique, timed pulsing, blending and pausing patterns that do the work for you! No more over or under blending, it delivers consistent results every time. Even my husband mentioned how good and smooth his smoothie was now, he said “it was like drinking a juice”.

   

After a successful smoothie blend, I decided to see if it could crumble up some graham crackers as I often use them in my recipes and hate whipping out another bulky counter top appliance. Guess what?! It worked! I had a cup of fine graham cracker crumbs in just three “Pulse” button presses.

   

Okay so now that I’ve told you how awesome this new Nutri Ninja Blender Duo with Auto-iQ is, let me dig right into my Champurrado recipe:

Simple ingredients and lots of love is all you need 🙂

Start off by boiling the water and the cinnamon stick together.

   

Blend the masa with water and then pass it through a fine stainer right into the boiling water.

Stir constantly while it comes to a boil.

   

Add the sugar and vanilla. Next, grate the Mexican chocolate right into the saucepan and let it simmer for a few minutes.

That’s it. Now you have a warm and delicious hot chocolate that will warm you right up too!

MEXICAN CHAMPURRADO (MEXICAN THICK HOT CHOCOLATE)

Prep: 5 min   |   Cook: 15 min   |   Yield: 4 servings

Ingredients

5 cups water

1 stick cinnamon

1/2 cup tortilla flour

1/4 cup light brown sugar

1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 disk Mexican chocolate (I used Chocolate Ibarra but you can also use Chocolate Abuelita)

Optional – JET-PUFFED Mallow Bits

Directions

In a medium saucepan, pour 3 cups of water and add the cinnamon stick and bring to boil for 5 minutes.

Using blender, mix 2 cups of water and tortilla flour. Strain mixture directly into boiling water pan using fine strainer. Bring to boil stirring constantly with wooded paddle. Cook slowly for 10 minutes, the mixture will thicken. Add sugar and vanilla. Continue to stir until ingredients are completely well incorporated.

While this mixture is simmering, grate chocolate disk into boiling mixture. Cook for about 3 minutes and until the chocolate has completely dissolved. With a molinillo or an eggbeater, whisk until a foam forms on top and champurrado is boiling, about 2 minutes.

Serve immediately in a mug and top with Mallow Bits.

 

Disclaimer: This is a review post for Ninja that were provided to me at no cost in order to for me to create a recipe.  I was not financially compensated and all opinions are genuine and my own. I only endorse and use products that I absolutely love and believe in.