Matcha Latte

Taimane Gardener released a new single called “Matcha Latte”, singing with her ukulele about the rewarding enjoyment of her favorite drink from a local cafe. It’s a cute and happy tune, I listened a few times, and then watched the music video with my daughter. Of course this inspired me to try drinking it for the first time this week too. I’ve had matcha tea before but had to use a search engine to understand what latte even could mean (mainly, it’s about what’s going on with the milk) I’m familiar with Pumpkin Spice Latte but it’s a word I only associated with coffee until now. I don’t know that a matcha latte will become my new favorite drink but I tried it three different times in the past week, what can I say but yes I am easily influenced by those I admire.  🍵

DUNKIN’ (I still want to call it Dunkin Donuts) spent $7,000,000 making an ad recently (something to show during the big USA football game) but I was motivated to get a drink there by an independent Hawaiian music artist I follow on Youtube. From my research on her special beverage I learned that Dunkin’ Matcha Latte is not remotely authentic, it wasn’t a surprise, they are using some pre-sweetened concoction to make the drink and so it’s completely unavailable without sugar. It cost about $5 for a medium and wasn’t an unsatisfactory experience. Any hot drink, on a cold day, is such a comfort! It was not bad in any way, but a new and weird flavor for me (milk and matcha). Japanese people call it “umami” I’ve heard, and I would describe it more like “funky”. It’s just strange and unknown to me. If you’ve had matcha and disliked it, I would guess the latte aspect is not going to improve this one for you. I drank the whole thing, contemplating with each sip whether I was actually enjoying it?!  It was more about the challenge of trying something new, bonding with a celeb who I have long felt para-social admiration, and giving myself a well-deserved treat after finally completing an unpleasant work task. 

The 2nd time I got a Matcha Latte was a few days later from a local café downtown (Café Kubal) and I was relieved to be able to get this one unsweetened. Calories are big source of anxiety for me, in all food items, and if there is ever a way to avoid them- I want the version without added sugar. The vibes in the coffee shop were much better than Dunkin in the mall! And it was not a celebratory libation this time, just me having time to kill and await my next bus while running errands. It was funky again, and I drank it all too, wondering again all the while if I do “like” it! That’s just how odd the flavor is. It tastes something like seaweed from the ocean but warm and milky as well. I definitely preferred matcha latte without the extra sugar, but I’m not convinced to give up on my usual choices nor experiment on more matcha latte variations in the near future either.  

The most recent and probably final matcha latte exploration I have to share was a canned drink from the grocery store. It’s made with oat milk rather than the normie dairy stuff and claims it’s “boosted with functional mushrooms”. I’ve tried other coffee drinks that contain Reishi and Maitake mushrooms before and really enjoyed their effects. They felt great again here too, but sadly this can was not the best of the 3 matcha lattes I tried. The flavor wasn’t bad, but being iced made it less enjoyable for me, and I guess that’s all I have to say about matcha lattes for now. 

I doubt I’ll seek it out this purposefully again, I’m going to stick with my plain hot steeped tea and occasional dark roast coffee for a while. If you have any drink suggestions though,  I am definitely willing to be adventurous with a cup of something new or unknown! Recommendations will help me as I dread becoming a “regular” with a consistent same order at every visit to the café. I like to switch up my choices and keep trying the different seasonal specials, or something new I heard about in a song (or from a stranger’s comment online) when I go out. It definitely comes from a place of anxiety, but I don’t think this quirk is harmful at all.

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My recent visit with my daughter was awesome. She just got a new job. It’s her first experience working “full time” hours and I’m happy since she seems to be excited about it. It’s a medical environment and I do worry about her involved there (I’ve heard it can be a competitive and quite nasty industry), but she’s actually looking forward to it, so I’ll try to remain supportive. It only took her about a week to get hired, from when she started looking for another job, I am really proud of her for that (maybe they are just desperate). She has a S.T.E.M. degree but has been working in retail like so many zoomers.

We started watching a show on Hulu called “The Great” it’s really good. I’m sure everyone who’s seen it already knows! It had been on my watch list for a while and we just finally started it. It’s a comedy with beautiful period costumes in every scene, the main characters are Catherine “The Great” of course and the 3rd Tsar of Russia named Peter. We binged the first few episodes then took a break to read about them on Wikipedia, find out what were the cause of deaths for these two because it was giving me anxiety (I needed to know if they were going to get killed by peasants or eachother, but that’s not what happened to them). We watched the full first season and it’s kind of killing me to wonder what will happen next on the show (yeah I got spoiled by Wikipedia but it’s still an intersting series) I might go and plough through every episode on my own now,  or maybe I’ll be chill and just re-watch the episodes we already saw together.

Enjoy the Full Snow Moon if it’s something you track. It’s the “smallest” moon of the year in appearance but still a powerful time for healing or charging up your powers  🌕