Good morning, it’s Friday. Let me say it a little louder for those in the back: IT’S FRIDAY, OK??? FRIDAY!
I lived for a hot second a number of years ago in Cambridge, MA. It wasn’t a good moment in my life, which means I spent a lot of time walking aimlessly around and trying to get my bearings.
I have nothing against Boston, per se; it’s a very nice city. But it isn’t New York. Once you’ve experienced the City that Never Sleeps, you measure all other cities against it. And, in my experience, most of them fall short.
I mean, come on, how can you call yourself a major metropolitan center if your public transit system shuts down at night?
I do have a few fond memories of my brief time in Cambridge, including a place – I can’t even remember the name now, which is sad – that served real hot chocolate. I’m speaking here of the kind that isn’t made from a powder, but rather by melting actual chocolate bars (or maybe chips?) and mixing it with cream or milk and maybe some spices for good measure.
The result is positively sinful – smooth, rich, creamy, and sort of viscous, but in a good way.
For those who lucky enough to have experienced this concoction, you know without a doubt that there is most definitely a difference between hot chocolate and hot cocoa.
The former is a decadent treat, but probably not an every day sort of indulgence, since it’s not only incredibly rich but also takes some time to make. The latter is made with cocoa powder and sweetener. This powdered stuff – a pale comparison to the real thing if there ever was one – is probably what most people think of when they hear “hot chocolate.” It’s a quick, easily made (just mix with hot water and/or milk of your choice), warming pick-me-up.
You probably have some dim awareness of hot chocolate’s origin story.
Around 500 BC or so, the Mayans started cultivating cacao trees and made a drink from its beans mixed with cornmeal, water, chili peppers and some other ingredients. The resulting mixture was poured back and forth between two vessels until it was frothy and then was consumed cold – mostly by the wealthy and also for ceremonial purposes.
The drink made its way to Europe compliments of the explorer Cortez, and though it was still a cold and bitter version of itself, it was enjoyed largely by royalty and the upper classes, who started the practice of adding sweeteners to the beverage to make it more palatable.
Years later, it became a huge hit in London, which had a number of chocolate shops – sort of the precursor to today’s coffee shops – though hot chocolate was also consumed for medical purposes (supposedly as a treatment for stomach and liver ailments).
Cocoa powder, meanwhile, which involves a process that removes the cocoa butter from the beans, which are then ground, was invented by the Dutch. This, by the way, is still not the instant hot cocoa mix that is so ubiquitous today, though it’s closer.
That mix usually contains dehydrated milk and sweeteners and was invented in the 1950s by a Wisconsin native named Charles Sanna, who was looking for a way to use up surplus powdered creamer. Sanna was the brain behind Swiss Miss, which is still around today. He lived to the ripe old age of 101 and died in 2019, which I’m not sure had anything to do with his level of chocolate consumption – something that’s supposed to be good for your health.
Today is National Cocoa Day, and it will definitely be a good day for consuming warm beverages. Temperatures will maybe, possibly, top out in the high-20s to low-30s, which is pretty chilly, compared to what we’ve been seeing of late. Skies will be mostly cloudy.
The weekend is looking not bad, with things warming up into the mid-30s by Sunday. No significant precipitation is in the forecast.
In the headlines…
Time magazine has named President-elect Donald Trump its 2024 person of the year, the second time the publication has given him that title.
Alongside the announcement of its person of the year pick, Time published an extensive interview with Trump in which he discusses the election, immigration, pardoning Jan. 6 rioters, the Middle East and Ukraine. (Find the transcript here).
Trump rang the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange yesterday, after praising his wife, Melania, as a “great” and “popular” first lady and vowing to make the American economy great again.
Trump backed the dockworkers’ union as it prepares for a strike over automation in mid-January — right before the former president is set to return to the Oval Office.
E-commerce giant Amazon is planning to donate $1 million to Trump’s inaugural fund, matching the amount Meta already donated to the incoming president’s inauguration.
Kash Patel, Trump’s pick to lead the FBI, has called its top ranks “a threat to the people” and published a list of enemies, vowing retribution for investigations of top Republicans. He appears — at least for now — to be on a glide path for confirmation.
Pete Hegseth, Trump’s Defense Secretary pick, will meet with the president-elect at the Army-Navy game on Saturday, a Hegseth adviser told The Hill.
President Joe Biden is commuting the sentences of roughly 1,500 people who were released from prison and placed on home confinement during the pandemic and is pardoning 39 Americans convicted of nonviolent crimes.
Biden’s announcement marks the largest single-day act of clemency in modern history. The pardons are for people convicted of nonviolent crimes, including drug offenses.
The Biden administration is reportedly quietly clearing away unused southern border wall materials to put up for auction — a move characterized by some lawmakers as an apparent ploy to sabotage Trump’s goal to secure the US-Mexico border.
The shooting of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson uncorked a deep well of pent-up consumer frustration over the country’s health insurance system. Some New Yorkers say they hope the discussion, notwithstanding how it began, might lead to change.
Police in San Francisco identified Thompson’s alleged killer, Luigi Mangione, and alerted the FBI four days before his high-profile arrest, a new report says.
An officer tipped off the feds after recognizing the 26-year-old’s face in surveillance images put out by the NYPD after Thompson was gunned down last week, sources told the San Francisco Chronicle.
Mangione reportedly did not have insurance through the company, according to NBC News.
New details are emerging about Mangione’s growing impatience with “a capitalist society” and his search for refuge in the mountains of Japan.
Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has reportedly launched a behind-the-scenes effort to thwart Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s (D-NY) bid to serve as the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee.
Pelosi, 84, would rather see Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-Va.) serve as ranking member on the high-profile panel and is “actively working to tank” the 35-year-old New York Democrat’s bid, according to Punchbowl News.
A significant hurdle facing dyslexic children in New York was cleared this week, when Gov. Kathy Hochul signed a bill into law that requires private insurers to cover the costs of key diagnostic tests.
Hochul has signed legislation that will require health insurers to cover EpiPens and caps the amount consumers will be required to pay out-of-pocket at $100, making the lifesaving treatment more affordable, the governor said in a news release.
One person was killed and another was left in critical condition after a small plane crashed on the highway in the northern suburbs of New York City last night just moments after the pilot reported engine issues, officials said.
The single-engine TECNAM P2008 went down around 7 p.m. in the grassy median of Interstate-684 near Exit 2 in Harrison after the pilot reported engine trouble about two miles from Westchester County Airport in White Plains.
The National Transportation Safety Board said the plane tried to land at the small airport after the engine failed, but did not make it and crashed onto the highway. The highway was closed between northbound Exit 2 and southbound Exit 3, according to officials.
“My heart goes out to the loved ones of those on board during this tragic incident, and I am praying for a safe recovery for the injured individual,” the governor said in a statement, noting that DEC was “working rapidly to contain and clean up” spilled gas.
Hochul is calling for a full review of the power outage that left thousands of subway riders stranded on Wednesday night in Brooklyn.
Trump wants to deport millions of migrants. New York City’s Democratic mayor is in a position to help him — and has the incentive to do so.
Incoming border czar Tom Homan lauded New York City Mayor Eric Adams yesterday, predicting that the Big Apple “is about to get a lot safer” after a Gracie Mansion meeting where they discussed the migrant crisis.
During the meeting with Homan, the mayor said he outlined the challenges the city faces regarding immigration and crime, noting ongoing conversations with federal authorities, including the incoming head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
“His goal is the same goal I have,” Adams said of Homan at a press conference following the meeting. “We cannot allow dangerous individuals to commit repeated violent acts of violence in our cities across America.”
Adams said he would issue an executive order to amend the city’s sanctuary laws during a fiery 10-minute press conference that followed his meeting with Homan, insisting the city would not be a “safe haven” for those who have “committed crimes.
New York Army National Guard soldiers will stop assisting city officials in shelters starting Dec. 18 as the migrant crisis cools off, and all troops in migrant shelters across the state will be sent home by March 31.
Adams and NYPD brass got a firsthand look at the desolate homeless wasteland inside the Big Apple subway system in an eye-opening overnight tour of the city’s transit vagrant crisis.
The Adams administration confirmed they are convening another charter revision commission to build on recent zoning reforms accomplished in the “City of Yes” for housing opportunity agenda.
After raising more than $100,000 in the past few months for a potential city comptroller campaign, Manhattan Borough President Mark Levine is officially jumping into the 2025 race for the fiscal watchdog post.
The city’s troubled child services agency tried to slap down claims its woke ideology is “putting kids at risk” — after a Post exposé revealed the shocking allegations from a whistleblower.
An explosion that blew a door off its hinges in an electric room that powers several New York City subway lines caused Wednesday night’s service meltdown for thousands of riders, highlighting the transit system’s aging infrastructure and modernization needs.
What might have been a pro-forma vote on a contract has revived the fierce debate about admissions and equity at New York City’s most elite high schools.
New York City parents sounded off on the admissions test to specialized high schools — with both proponents and critics saying a decision, either for or against a contract to continue the exam, was the “moral” thing to do.
According to the Knot’s 2023 Real Weddings Study, the average NYC nuptials cost $63,000, part of a larger upward trend in wedding spending. The costs are partly driven by the fact that many weddings are no longer one-day affairs.
As ride-hailing companies and labor unions each push New York City to amend its rules, drivers hurt by widespread app lockouts are struggling to make ends meet.
The Upper West Side’s Absolute Bagels inexplicably and abruptly closed, and its legions of fans are very upset.
Oren and Alon Alexander, twins who were once fixtures of Miami and New York’s nightlife circuit, appeared in state court on sexual battery charges in Miami yesterday.
The police department in Mount Vernon, in Westchester County, has a long-running pattern of improper strip searches, according to a report released yesterday by the Department of Justice and the U.S. attorney’s office for the Southern District of New York.
Many nurses at Albany Medical Center Hospital are pushing back on an influential labor union that has been a controlling force in their protracted and combative contract dispute with hospital executives.
Free Form Fibers of Saratoga Springs was awarded a $925,898 grant from the Department of Energy that could help it validate plans to supply silicon carbide powder to the semiconductor industry.
St. Peter’s Health Partners has reached out to patients to tell them that the health network has not yet reached a contract agreement with health insurer Aetna for services within the St. Peter’s system of hospitals and medical practices.
University at Albany alumni are organizing to “Save the Dippikill,” warning that the Student Association may sell its Adirondack camp.
Photo credit: George Fazio.
