Real cacao, or twelve ingredients pretending to be it
Swiss Miss and Choffy both end up as a hot chocolate-coloured drink, and that is where it stops. One is a mix built on sugar with cocoa in it. The other is the cacao bean itself, roasted, ground and brewed like coffee, with whatever you choose to add afterwards.
Sweeten it yourself, or don’t.
What is actually in each of them
Sugar is the first ingredient in the mix
Swiss Miss Milk Chocolate lists, in order: sugar, corn syrup, modified whey, cocoa (processed with alkali), hydrogenated coconut oil, nonfat milk, then salt, dipotassium phosphate, mono- and diglycerides, acesulfame potassium, sucralose and artificial flavour. Twelve items, two of them artificial sweeteners. Ours is roasted cacao, and the list ends there.
Their cocoa has been through an alkali. Ours has not.
“Processed with alkali” on a label is not a description a brand chooses — US law requires it. It is a chemical step applied after the bean, and it destroys most of the flavanols: one study measured total flavanols falling from 34.6 mg per gram in natural cocoa to 3.9 at the heaviest treatment. We never alkalize, because we are not trying to make the colour darker or the taste milder.
One dissolves. The other brews.
A mix is stirred into hot water and you drink all of it, powder included. Choffy is ground coarse and brewed in a press, a drip basket, a pour-over or a single-serve cup compatible with Keurig® brewers, and the grounds stay behind — which is why it pours dark and clean rather than thick.
The two labels, side by side
Both statements are printed on the packets. Nothing here is our characterisation of them.
| Choffy | Swiss Miss Milk Chocolate | |
|---|---|---|
| Ingredients | 1 | 12 |
| First ingredient | Roasted cacao | Sugar |
| Added sugar | None | Sugar and corn syrup |
| Artificial sweeteners | None | Acesulfame potassium, sucralose |
| Artificial flavour | None | Yes |
| Cocoa treated with alkali | Never | Yes, as declared on the label |
| Hydrogenated oil | None | Hydrogenated coconut oil |
| How you make it | Brewed and strained | Dissolved in hot water |
| Who decides the sweetness | You | The recipe |
Swiss Miss ingredient statement as published, 15 September 2026. Our ingredient statement is on our own bag. Read the current packet before relying on either. Swiss Miss is a trademark of its respective owner. Choffy Inc. is not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Swiss Miss, and all comparisons are drawn from each brand’s own published materials on the dates shown above.
“I enjoy my cup of Choffy every morning with French Vanilla creamer. Tastes like hot chocolate!”
Cathy Korger · verified buyer · Ivory Coast Dark
Where people start
Our deepest roast, or three estates side by side. Nothing to brew with yet? The Starter Kit adds the press.
Volta Dark Choffy Brewed Cacao
Volta Dark — the roast that reads most like a dark bar in the cup, without a grain of sugar in it.
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French Roast Variety Set Choffy Brewed Cacao
Ecuador, Nigeria and Ivory Coast at the same French roast — three origins, so you can taste what the estate changes.
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Choffy Brewed Cacao - Dark Roast Starter Kit
Four dark roasts — Ecuador, Volta, Nigeria and Ivory Coast, 10 oz each — plus our 14 oz tumbler press, a French press and travel cup in one. Everything you need to brew on day one.
Shop thisQuestions about the swap
Will it taste like hot chocolate?
Not on its own. This is unsweetened and it is meant to be — dark, roasted and closer to strong black coffee than to anything sweet. Add milk and sugar and it moves a long way towards a hot chocolate, with you deciding how far.
Is it just cocoa powder?
No. Cocoa powder has had most of the cacao butter pressed out and is usually treated with an alkali, and it dissolves rather than brewing. This is the whole roasted bean, ground coarse, brewed and strained.
Can my children drink it?
No added sugar, no artificial sweetener, no artificial flavour and one ingredient — a good deal less than is in a packet of mix. Like any chocolate it does contain a small amount of caffeine, naturally, and so does hot chocolate. Plenty of families drink it together; how young is your call, and worth a word with your paediatrician if you are unsure. Sweeten it to taste.
What does “processed with alkali” mean?
It means the cocoa was treated with an alkali after the bean, to darken the colour and soften the flavour. US labelling rules require it to be declared, which is why you see it on the packet. Measured across commercial powders, that step took total flavanols from 34.6 mg per gram down to 3.9 at the heaviest treatment. Ours never goes near it.
How do I make it?
Like coffee. Two tablespoons per 6 oz of water, just off the boil, three minutes in a French press — or a drip basket, a pour-over, or a single-serve cup compatible with Keurig® brewers.
From people who swapped the mix for the bean
Google, Amazon and Walmart figures last checked 11 September 2026. The on-site figure updates itself.
“We have been drinking Choffy for many years… Our grandchildren ask for it all the time. We are definitely a Choffy loving family of multiple generations”
“Don’t expect hot chocolate though, it is more like cooking chocolate so I add a little sugar and cream. I call it a sophisticated hot chocolate.”
“For me, I don’t like coffee, tea isn’t satisfying, and hot chocolate is too sweet/sugary. Enter choffy…”
One ingredient, three roasts, no sugar
Roasted cacao, ground for a press or a drip machine. What goes in after that is yours.
Shop every roast →