I am really hesitant about the concept of a green tea latte to start with. I have such a hard time thinking about putting milk with green tea. Then I decided that it can work for green tea ice cream so I shouldn't be so quick to judge.
The first thing I noticed was the absolutely fluorescent color - definitely a day-glo green - spilling out from the cup. I removed the cover to see the minty green concoction looking back at me. I eyed it warily. It smelled sweet and I did detect the scent of green tea...encouraging. On the first sip I was struck by three things: 1) It was not as horrible as I feared; 2) it tasted more like honeydew melon than anything else; and 3) there actually was a green tea aftertaste if you got past the melon.
I poured the latte from the paper cup to a mug when I got home and noticed the dark green matcha on the bottom of the cup. I did have a problem with the Starbucks website stating, "With one sip, you reincarnate the original spirit of enlightenment that may have inspired the Japanese tea ceremony." I understand PR and marketing and all that, but really. A little much. I have a hard time connecting this melon drink in a to-go cup with the ancient Zen ritual.
This is definitely not something I would buy again. It was much, much too sweet. I find that Starbucks has always had this tendency, but it has gotten much worse over the past couple of years. Apparently they mix their matcha with sugar and then add MELON SYRUP. I knew I tasted honeydew something. It reminds me of a pretty similarly unappealing drink I tried at Panera a couple of years back. I never would have ordered it if I had known about the melon syrup. I read online that many people ask them to halve the syrup or replace it with vanilla with better results. I don't think I could handle another attempt!
Some people swear that the iced is better. All I know is that when this one began to get cold it went from unappealing to unpalatable.
I knew I should have gotten coffee.
***UPDATE: 3/26/09 - Starbucks has a new recipe for their Green Tea Lattes. No more melon syrup. Hooray! I mentioned it at the start of my 3/26/09 post. (The post is titled Equal Exchange First Flush Darjeeling.) MUCH better. Still too sweet, but actually pretty tasty.
Taken from http://teapages.blogspot.com/
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