Coffee is the first thing many people drink to start their day.
However, the rise of social media has inspired caffeinated lovers to stray away from staple espresso bevs and complicate their orders to be more aesthetically pleasing.
Customers’ desire to try trending coffee drinks makes disgruntled baristas’ work routines more difficult.
Huff Post consulted coffee experts around the country to reveal the seven coffees you should never order because they aren’t as good as social media makes them seem.
Starbucks’s notable “caramel macchiato” isn’t what you think it is. Although the drink is described online as “freshly steamed milk with vanilla-flavored syrup marked with espresso and topped with a caramel drizzle,” it’s actually not a caramel macchiato.
The drink’s name, macchiato, means “marked,” as in marking the top of an espresso shot with a splash of milk and foam, Stephen Power, a former Starbucks employee who currently serves as the lead barista of Meanwhile Brewing Co. in Austin, Texas told the Huff Post.
Power revealed that “Starbucks has used the word to mean that the espresso marks the top of the milk [instead].”
So when many Starbucks lovers order the alleged caramel macchiato, they are ordering “an ‘upside-down’ latte with vanilla syrup at the bottom and caramel drizzle on top,” confessed Romina Chavez, manager of Killebrew Coffee in Nashville, Tennessee. An “upside-down” latte and a macchiato “are extremely different from each other but are so easily confused for one another.”
Every sip of mocha is a moment of bliss unless you order it moments before closing.
“Let’s say that [a shop is] closing at 5 p.m. and someone comes in at 4:59 p.m. and orders a mocha, then that becomes a slight inconvenience because it requires using the espresso machine and multiple ingredients, followed by more cleanup,” said Adam Keita, co-owner of Daughter in Brooklyn, New York.
Curating a mocha requires a long process of brewing espresso, steaming milk and adding chocolate and other ingredients, which can be a headache for baristas at the end of their shift.
“I personally don’t understand the appeal of mocha. Many good coffee shops use a great base product [espresso], only to overpower the beautiful delicate flavors of the coffee with a cheap chocolate syrup, and stirring the chocolate into the espresso completely ruins the crema!” explained Bartho Saayman, director of food and beverage at Carpenter Coffee Bar in Austin, Texas.
For those who fall in love with the fa la la lattes, you should ease off the sugared holiday drinks.
“The recipes are too sweet. I don’t like to ask for ‘less sweet’ or other modifications because the [original] recipe is how the drink is meant to taste,” said Chuck Wylie, general manager of Jo’s Red River in Austin. “I want to taste the coffee, not the sugar!”
Unlike holiday lattes, a traditional latte is made up of one or two shots of espresso, steamed milk and a layer of frothed milk on top,” explained the Nescafe website. Experts deem lattes as one of the “safest” drinks to make no matter where you order it from.
Despite the holiday joy the festive drinks bring, baristas are no fan of trending beverages such as the Pumpkin Spice latte.
“Fancy lattes will always be flashes in the pan because they are niche and more focused on visual appeal than flavor,” said Reuben Villagomez, owner of Paloma Coffee and Bakery in Brooklyn.
Although lavender lattes are a popular drink for many people seeking wellness benefits such as calmness and relaxation, too much of the flower flavor can become overwhelming.
“The floral flavor can be very strong and not as pleasant as it reads on paper,” admitted Camille Pardoe, a barista at Crew Coffee and Cremerie at Lido House in Newport Beach, California.
Another coffee expert, Lauren Beene, general manager of Walton’s Fancy and Staple in Austin, Texas, noticed several issues with lavender lattes, such as “too much lavender flower added in the simple syrup, or [the flowers] could be steeped too long in the process of making the syrup.”
Also, lavender lattes tend to taste different from coffee shop to coffee shop because each place likely sources their lavender from different vendors.
Another barista no-no is olive oil lattes because adding oil to a latte “will dominate the whole drink,” said Kirstine Gjerding Grøn, head of people and barista education developer of Ole and Steen in New York City.
Some people don’t mind sipping on the mixture for health benefits to their digestive system since olive oil has laxative properties and caffeine can encourage motion in the gastrointestinal tract. However, once the two properties unite, they could “kickstart your whole system in a way where you will need to stay close to a bathroom,” Grøn added.
The shaken beverage is made with espresso “then shaken, chilled and mellowed with sweetness and a touch of milk,” the Starbucks website read. However, once the hot shots of espresso are poured over the ice, it begins to melt, diluting the coffee flavor.
“A shaken espresso would dilute the coffee, resulting in a pretty wimpy flavor,” explained Jordan Deleon, barista at Mañana Coffee in Austin, Texas.
Don’t bother ordering a Vietnamese iced coffee if the beans aren’t grown in Vietnam.
“Unless the business is using coffee beans from Vietnam, I would not order this,” urged Sahra Nguyen, founder of Nguyen Coffee Supply.
Vietnamese coffee growers produce robusta beans, which indicates Vietnamese coffee culture. The taste of robusta beans is poignant even when mixed with condensed milk. The iced coffee is traditionally brewed with a phin filter, a pour-over brewing tool that produces layers of flavor for best results.
Nguyen shames establishments that sell inauthentic Vietnamese coffee beans.
She claims they are “appropriating cultural cachet for profit. Companies must focus on authenticity and the unique qualities of different coffee beans rather than simply capitalizing on cultural trends without regard for the communities that created the culture.”