If there is one thing I’m NEVER giving up it is coffee. Right now I have my perfect little Nespresso U sitting on my countertop waiting for me to brew my next shot of Espresso and make a delicious latte. When I started reading ingredient labels I also started wondering about the coffee drinks I had, at one time or another, ordered from various restaurants/food chains. Since I wasn’t making them myself I had no idea what I was consuming. There was a time that I went to Starbucks at least two to three times a week. With the sweetness of most of Starbucks specialty drinks (unless you are getting them plain) it is pretty obvious they aren’t “healthy”. What I found however was not the sugar in the drinks that concerned me, it was the other chemicals.
In the picture above I listed the ingredients you would consume if you purchased a caramel iced coffee at McDonald’s, Dunkin Donuts, and Starbucks. While I can’t say one is better then the others it is obvious McDonald’s is the worst in terms of hidden ingredients. Although their marketing has been trying to compete in the coffee world and set them apart from their cheap, low quality food they are failing to live up to the image they are trying to portray. Why? Its simple…. there is nothing quality about their coffee. If they were sensible at all they would just add real cream or half and half and call it a day. Even if they dropped the “light cream” they would still have caramel coloring (coffee IS brown!!!) and preservatives but at least consumers wouldn’t be running to find the nearest toilet after downing their coffee. Oh yeah.. that’s right I forgot to tell you.. tetra sodium pyrophosphate and sodium citrate both have diarrhea listed as possible adverse reactions. If something about that “one time after you drank that coffee” just clicked all I can say is never trust McDonald’s!
As for the rest of the unpronounceable ingredients if you’d like to be nauseous, have irritated skin, or consume a chemical listed with “use caution in patients with cardiac failure, hypertension, impaired renal function, peripheral and pulmonary edema, and toxemia of pregnancy” then just go ahead and grab that iced coffee from McDonald’s to go (just incase you have to shit, puke, or have a heart attack).
Look I’ll just cut to the chase here. It’s time to rethink these purchases. All three coffees contain caramel coloring (again coffee IS brown!!), and chemical preservatives. It’s also note worthy that McDonald’s and Starbucks use artificial flavorings (which could be anything, we have no idea what that includes),and Dunkin Donuts uses High Fructose Corn Syrup. All three of these iced coffees have more then one ingredient that has no business being in our coffee.
The first step to cutting these highly processed iced coffees from our lives is finding an alternative that doesn’t contain any of these questionable ingredients. If you want coffee but you do not like it black then I would suggest trying it with real cream and adding a natural sweetener yourself (honey, maple syrup). I know it seems kind of weird to put maple syrup in your coffee but I promise it is actually good! As I mentioned before I have a Nespresso machine that I make lattes with everyday. I find lattes with just espresso and milk to be really tasty and I also have a milk frother that came with the machine that makes an amazing cappuccino. Since purchasing my Nespresso I have been using my own spice cabinet to create drinks myself that have all turned out really delicious. If you are buying coffee drinks from places like Starbuck’s or Dunkin Donuts it is best to keep things simple. I just get a plain latte from Starbuck’s now if I go there and I know exactly what is in it… milk and espresso! If you want to check out my Nespresso Machine here is the link.
