Coffee fedi, help me out!
I’m getting more and more milk/lactose intolerant as I get older, but lactose free milk is too sweet for me.
I don’t sweeten my coffee, and even lactose free milk with no sweetener else makes my coffee too sweet.
So, what do I replace my milk with when I order coffee?
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Oat milk is the best alternative I’ve found. Most places offer it so I switched to oat milk lattes and haven’t gone back.
If brewing at home, there are barista versions made specifically for coffee, but the original works too.
Oat milk > actual milk when it comes to coffee imo.
As a barista and a vegan, this is the answer. Out of all the plant-based milks, oat is the closest to cow’s milk when it comes to how it foams up, so baristas tend to make way better and more consistent drinks with oat than almond or soy. And this is just personal preference, but IMO the taste profile of oat works the best with coffee.
Totally agree! I am currently frothing Chobani oat milk with no added sugar for diy lattes and it is perfect!
Personally, oat milk works fine with caramel syrups, but doesn’t taste as good with mints or chocolate as soy does.
I second this, but you will need to find the one you like, different brands can taste VERY differently.
This is very important, don’t give up after 1-2 tests! I tested 6+ until I found my favourite (surprise: it’s a barista edition!).
Agreed. I love one particular brand and find a lot of others have cardboard undertones.
Oatly Barista has the best taste imo.
BLACK. DRINK IT BLACK. PUT SOME HAIR ON YOUR CHEST. DRINK IT BLACK.
Sorry about that. I have seen you say you cannot do it, but this is false. You can acquire a taste for black coffee, and it will make your coffee drinking much easier as well as improve your palate for tasting coffee. Also black coffee has only like 5 calories per cup vs 80-120 calories if you put milk in it.
I love black coffee.
Just pure raw dogging coffee bean water.
I went black and, well, you know the saying.
One of the upsides is it’s now really easy to tell what places sell garbage tier coffee (cough, Tim Hortons, cough)
I’m not sure I’m keen on my boobs being hairy, but I got myself a black coffee today…
We’ll see how it goes :)
Yes! Welcome to the dark side. Have fun!
I think it’s probably good to leave misguided ideas about masculinity out of it - although I’m sure you weren’t being serious, of course.
That being said, speciality coffee brewed with care can often be quite enjoyable to drink black and I agree that it’s worth trying out for OP.
BLACK. DRINK IT BLACK
Ha!
I like my coffee the same way as Mr. Wolf in Pulp Fiction.
It really depends on the type of coffee you have available. Light roasted single origin specialty coffee doesn’t require any milk at all, whereas dark roasted random robusta blend certainly does.
Definitely Oat.
There are brands that make some specifically to emulate the flavour and texture of cow milk, often named something along the lines of “not milk”.
Alternatively “Barista” variants often have a slightly raised fat content and added soy or other protein to improve foamability.Cheapest option is to make it yourself: ~90g oats per 1000ml water
- soak and rinse oats
- blend oats, pinch of salt and water
- don’t blend too long, the mix gets a bit gluey otherwise
- strain through a cheese cloth or similar
- leave in the fridge overnight
Optional stuff:
add ~2 dates to the blender for a bit of sweetness
you can experiment with adding some cashews to the blend, or ~2 tbsp of neutral tasting oil to the blender for creamier consistency.
I heard xanthan gum can also be added to thicken the mix.Additional coffee
Nothing? Or alternatively a single mocha shot?
But really I think the best thing would be to switch to cold brew dilute with a little water and ice and nothing more.
Nothing isn’t going to happen. I’ve tried and tried to enjoy it over the years, but it lacks “body” or something…
Try a few(!, as in, 3-5 single grains) of salt to reduce acidity. For body you could try French press or mesh filtered, gets more chewy mouthfeel but that’s a coin flip if you might like it or not.
Have you tried doing your own cold brew concentrate and then cutting it with water and Ice before? It really changes the profile of some coffee.
There is also the phrase garbage in garbage out, so if your starting with a low quality bean or over roasted bean you could be missing out on all the natural flavors in coffee.
Im lazy so I generally just do a simple Chemex filtered drip but even that created a cup miles better than any kurig or mr coffee equivalent that I found out I could really enjoy coffee without adding anything.
If I end up at Tim’s or Dunkin then its a shot of mocha because I struggle to drink their coffee black because of how over roasted the beans are. They cook all the flavors out of it to make it “consistent.”
Almond milk. Non-sweet is an option.
Yes, non-sweetened almond milk is my favourite and it doesn’t go weird when you pour it in coffee.
After starting to drink my coffee black I’ve just been using it as an alternative to milk in nearly everything.
Oat milk is probably the best, imho. Although don’t dismiss soya milk, especially the barista versions. Personally I went cold turkey on milk in coffee years ago and never looked back. If it’s lacking something without milk, try different coffee! 20 years ago I was a 100% grande latte drinker, but now I’m a freshly ground double espresso every morning.
Oat milk and coffee taste like they’re meant to be together.
Just make sure it’s a good Oat Milk. The Chobani extra creamy is my favorite.
Another idea is to drop some coconut oil into the coffee. It’s different but it’s something and you don’t taste the coconut if you get refined oil.
Oat milk lattes are so fantastically creamy, mmmm. I’m also a fan of plain old soy.
The best alternative I found when doing this was Mylk, which is Oat based but a lot more complex a formulation than most of the just Oat milks, the whole equivalent is the best, the coffee targeted one IMO wasn’t great but its worth a try also.
However ultimately I learnt how to make coffee to get more complex flavours out of it and bought speciality coffee with a decent grinder and ended up finding sweetness in the coffee itself when its brewed well. This is the rabbit hole that is worth pursing, black coffee made a variety of ways.
The other possibility is start taking in some homemade kefir, it might reduce the lactose intolerance.
Another vote from me for out and almond milk. If you do any kind of milk steaming or latte art then oat is great for that…and I just like the flavour of almond milk. It’s really nice with breakfast cereals too as it adds a nice nutty flavour to everything.
There is nothing wrong with Soy milk, but with coffee you have to be careful you don’t curdle it due to the high temperature.
A friend recommended Oat milk to me - I’m exactly the same as you re disliking the sweetness of lactose free - she reckons it’s ‘inoffensive’.
I know you’ve already gotten a bunch of answers including the going black option that I’m chiming in with… But I went through a similar process a few years back now. It took experimenting with lots of different brands until I found one that I could happily drink black. Not sure where you’re located, but I found a local roaster that I’ve been super pleased with. It’s called Goshen. It’s more expensive coffee but it’s also ruined a lot of other coffee for me now
I tried all the options (soy, oat, pea, lactose free) and they all sucked. If it is available, get some lactase supplement and stick with the real thing.
Water? Maybe shift to a “long black” style.
I would have recommended oat, but if you say lactose free milk is already too sweet I think you’re likely to find the same with oat. Macadamia is probably the “creamiest” non-sweet alternative I’ve tried, give it a shot.
That being said, stay open to the idea of cutting back on additives altogether. I went through all sorts of things just to discover that what I liked wasn’t a particular creamer or sweetener or coffee brand - it was just lighter roasted coffee 😅
I find whole milk to be very sweet in comparison to oak milk, with skim being even sweeter.
