CoffTea: My Accidental Discovery

...and my new favorite obsession....

One morning I decided to add some health benefits to my French Press coffee. I crumbled in some dried soursop leaves, believed by many to be a cancer preventative, and tossed in a tablespoon of gunpowder green tea which is filled with antioxidants and known to boost immunity and heart health. It tasted really delicious and I have been doing it ever since. I call it my CoffTea.

Then this morning I was on Pinterest and was surprised to see others doing something similar. One pairs iced coffee with Matcha green tea that looked delicious so I thought I would share their recipe here with you. Its from coffee sphere.com. It puts a layer of Matcha foam on top of iced cold brew coffee. You will need a hand held milk frother to make it.

Matcha Coffee

1/2 teaspoon vanilla matcha powder

1/4 cup milk

1 cup cold brew coffee or cold coffee

Directions:

• 1. Brew coffee. Use your favorite coffee brewing method. For this recipe, I used cold brew coffee. 

• 2. Froth matcha powder and milk with a milk frother.

• 3. Pour coffee into a glass, top with frothed matcha. 

• 4. Optional: Add ice 

Someone else was infusing coffee with chai tea, which sounded really good so I tried that as well. Here is their recipe. It’s from BakedBrewedBeautiful.com The spices that go into making chai tea combinations provide antibacterial and anti-inflammatory benefits in addition to tea’s many benefits.

In this case, they used a Cold Brew Maker to do it.

Chai Iced Tea

 8 tsp chai looseleaf tea

 380 g filtered water

Chai Cold Brew

 1 cup iced chai tea

 ½ cup cold brew

 3 ice cubes

 milk and sweetener to taste

Chai Iced Tea

Begin by dumping the chai looseleaf tea into the filter of your Ovalware cold brew coffee maker. Pour the water over the tea leaves and stir. Let it steep in the fridge for 12 hours. Remove the filter after the steeping has been completed.

Chai Cold Brew

Combine the chai iced tea and the cold brew in a glass and serve with plenty of ice. Add milk and sweetener to taste.

Over on CrazyCoffeeBean.com they were making a Dirty Matcha Latte that caught my eye. So here you go! Another take on the tea coffee combination! For this one you need an espresso maker or just buy espresso instant powder and make a serving of espresso from that.

Dirty Matcha Latte

• 1 cup milk (or a non-dairy alternative)

• 1 teaspoon matcha powder

• 1 shot of espresso

• 1 cup ice cubes

• 1 teaspoon sweetener or simple syrup (optional)

Instructions

1. Pull a shot of espresso. Set aside. (or make with instant espresso powder)

2. Add half a cup of milk and matcha powder to a glass. If you prefer your latte sweet, add sugar or syrup. Blend it with the handheld milk frother.

3. Add ice cubes to the glass and push them down so they are submerged as much as possible.

4. Slowly pour the remaining milk over the back of a spoon on top of the matcha.

5. Pour the shot of espresso on top.

6. Mix well before drinking.

While I was on the Matcha trail, I perused Amazon for an interesting cookbook about coffee and found this one, The Home Cafe, which perfectly matched the mood I am currently in while exploring tea and coffee combinations or creative ways to use either one.

It was the dessert-inspired recipes that intrigued me. Consider Tiramisu Espresso con Pan, Shaken Maple Espresso, Toasted Coconut Affogato….they all looked so good! I haven't tried them all yet, but the ones I have are great.

News: I am working on my next cookbook and am in the throes of testing recipes. If any of you would like to volunteer to test recipes for me, let me know?! I have a group that have been doing it for me for all my cookbooks, but this cookbook has so many recipes that I definitely could use more recipe testers!!!! Thank you!