Call me old-fashioned, but I just like a regular cup of joe. If I’m in the mood for a latte, I like it sweet and French vanilla-y. I’m not into a lot of weird flavors in my coffee. (Take me to get a drink at Sonic during Happy Hour, now, there’s a different story.)
I always see seasonal latte flavors at the convenience store and the bookstore and I was wondering what the oddest flavors might be. Here’s what I came up with.
10. Eggnog: This flavor isn’t so weird on it’s own, but do we really need to make it into a latte flavor? Couldn’t you just, you know, heat up a glass of eggnog?
9. Tea Lattes: When Starbucks first started serving these, I was a bit skeptical; however, they’re quite delicious, and really nothing new. Red lattes with rooibos tea are common in South Africa.
8. Coconut Coffee: I think this might just be gross to me because I’m not a huge coconut fan. But when you think of coconut drinks, don’t you conjure images of islands in the sun, cocktails and summertime—rather than cozying up with a latte?
7. Single Malt Scotch Coffee: OK, I get an Irish Coffee, and all the coffee-flavored drinks out there… but this just seems to be making coffee into a drink-to-get-drunk frenzy. Before you know it you’ll be hearing “I’ll have a jack and coffee, please” at the bar.
6. Café Latte Slurpuccino: OK, this is your basic frozen coffee drink, just Slurpee-ized. Not entirely weird, but the name is pretty awful. I’ve never tried one but I hear they’re pretty gross.
5. Banana Coffee: Again, this tropical flavor just doesn’t sound like coffee.
4. Bacon: Of course, it’s no surprise given the big bacon frenzy of the country, but the thought of such a flavored coffee still makes me want to hurl.
3. Pepsi Kaffe: This is coffee-flavored soda sold in Mexico, South America and Central America. I don’t think I’d ever even want to try it. Would you? I suppose if it were simply an iced coffee it could be good, but I’m betting it’s pretty soda-fied. Coca-Cola sells similar products as well, including the Georgia coffee products which are popular in Asia.
2. Violet Sweet Potato Latte: Doesn’t this sound like a character from Strawberry Shortacke? “Hurry, Violet Sweet Potato, the Purple Pieman is after your sweet potato garden!”
1. Civet Coffee: The Palm Civet, a wild cat native to Asia, eats the berries from the coffee plant, poops them out… and has them collected by workers to make them into coffee beans.
Yeah.
Both the Barking Deer of Southeast Asia and the Formosan Rock Monkey are also sources of such “processing methods,” the former through its stool and the latter through its spit. Yum.
Do you know of any stranger flavors? Share them here!