East Idaho Eats: Gourmet hot chocolate at the Cocoa Lodge

IDAHO FALLS — In the summer it’s easy to find food and drink shacks scattered around the Upper Valley selling frozen treats. But in the winter, most of those shacks go dark.

The exception is the Cocoa Lodge, a Rexburg-based drink shack that opens in the winter to sell gourmet hot cocoa. Owner Katie Phillips came up with the winter-themed shop about three years ago.

“(It was an) on-the-spot decision. We bought the shack in the end of August, and we opened up in October. So it was about a month where we thought of the ideas with the recipes and what we were going to sell,” Phillips said.

The Cocoa Lodge offers a full drink menu and there are thousands of flavor possibilities.

“My favorite drink is probably the coconut tres leches. It’s our best seller,” Cocoa Lodge employee Kay Anderson said. “It’s coconut and caramel in a milk-chocolate base, or in white chocolate peppermint. It’s like a candy cane flavor — it’s super good.”

As far as the chocolate mixes go Phillips said her ideas come from her own design, or what others suggest.

“I just think of everything that I like to mix with chocolate,” she said. “A lot of my workers have great ideas. We get ideas from our customers, friends, family. They tell us what they like and then I try to see if I can make it.”

These self-proclaimed cocoa-connoisseurs keep their hot chocolate mixes under wraps, but they do share the basics of a great hot cocoa. The appropriate amount of hot water is measured out, followed by a milk powder. Next the requested flavors are added and the cocoa is topped off with whipped cream.

The cocoa hut’s drive-in stays consistently busy throughout the winter months. Rexburg resident Jordan Davenport said he and his wife enjoy coming to the Cocoa Lodge at least twice a week.

“It’s really rich and I like it,” Davenport said.”I get the Minty Knight. The sizes are nice for the price, and … it’s delicious.”

In addition to hot cocoa, the Cocoa Lodge also sells homemade bakery treats.

“We use really good ingredients and I hand-make most of the mixes,” Phillips said. “I home bake all of the cookies, the biscotti and cupcakes, and I use from scratch recipes, so nothing is from a box, or processed.”

The Cocoa Lodge is a charming brown shack located next to the Taco Bell lot on Main Street in Rexburg. Find the Cocoa Lodge on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter.

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