Hot chocolate

And besides that, the stuff just plain tasted good.Mara Jade

Luke-hot-chocolate — A cup of hot chocolate is served to Luke Skywalker.

Hot chocolate was an exotic warm chocolate milk drink. It had many aficionados, some of the most famous being Lando Calrissian and Luke Skywalker. Skywalker had grown so fond of the drink that he had kept a secret stash of the pods used to make it aboard his brother-in-law's freighter.^[2] His wife Mara Jade also enjoyed it. The Solo family, Han, Leia, and Allana had a tradition of drinking the beverage while watching the The Perre Needmo Newshour.^[3] Hot chocolate was frowned upon in Palpatine's court and among smugglers, as Imperial officials viewed the drink as plebeian, and the smugglers preferred strong alcoholic beverages.^[1] After the Yuuzhan Vong War, hot chocolate became a rarity, because the Yuuzhan Vong had re-shaped seven of the eight planets that were home to the plant that produced the pods that were used to make it during the conflict.^[2]

Preparation

While most inhabitants of the galaxy were used to their hot chocolate just coming out of a dispenser nozzle, quite a few were of the opinion that hot chocolate was best when made from scratch. Here were the instructions for doing so:

Put several pods in a standard shipboard multiprocessor then set the multiprocessor to dry and powder.
Wait until the multiprocessor chimes, add small amount of water and a lot of sweetener then set it to agitate and heat.
Wait until the multiprocessor chimes, then add milk.
Instruct the multiprocessor to heat the hot chocolate slowly.
Wait until the processor chimes; the hot chocolate is ready to be served.

A number of things were used to enhance the taste of hot chocolate:

A sliver of tang bark. (aka cinnamon)
A drop of orchid bean extract. (aka vanilla)
A dollop of mallow paste on top. (aka marshmallow)

Behind the scenes

Hot chocolate was first introduced to the Star Wars galaxy by Timothy Zahn in his 1991 novel Heir to the Empire. Zahn received some criticism for featuring a drink found on Earth in the novel, but noted that other real-world concepts such as falcons had already become a part of Star Wars.^[4]