How Starbucks Whips Up Its Famous Cold Foam

Starbucks originally began offering cold foam in 2014, on the Seattle Starbucks Reserve menu. It wasn't until 2018 that the whipped topping made its way to regular Starbucks menus nationwide, initially unveiling it in the form of what it called a cascara cold foam, made with a sweet syrup made from concentrated coffee cherry skins. While it was far from the first cafe to experiment with cold frothed milk, Starbucks is the one who brought it to the masses — and you'd be surprised how relatively easy it is to make.

There are a lot of store bought cold foams out there, and some of them are better than others. But, in the pursuit of the perfect Starbucks cold foam copy cat at home, you'd likely be better off grabbing a carton of milk and some vanilla syrup. In a video shared on YouTube, a Starbucks employee demonstrated how the chain makes its cold foam in store — and, ingredient wise, that's essentially all it involves. With a blender, a half a cup of nonfat milk, and a couple tablespoons of vanilla syrup, you can whip up your own in seconds.

Whipping up your own Starbucks cold foam at home really is as simple as adding all of the ingredients to a blender and pressing a button. Poured on top of the best store-bought cold brew or your own homemade pumpkin spice latte, you won't need to pull into a Starbucks again. However, there are advantages to getting it there.

The beauty of cold foam is its simplicity, and Starbucks' recipe only goes to show that. But, it also goes to show the sheer amount of ways it can be customized. Since the year it was first debuted, Starbucks has introduced its cold foam in an infinitely wide range of flavors. From the pumpkin cream cold foam on its fall menu to the holiday season peppermint chocolate cream cold foam, to the springtime lavender cold foam — Starbucks cold foam might just be one ingredient in your iced drinks, but it's as customizable as any beverage it has on its menu. The best part is that doing is so is as simple as substituting the usual syrup for something different, and or adding a bit of something else.

For example, the Starbucks pumpkin cream cold brew is made by simply adding a pump of its famous pumpkin spice syrup to the mix prior to blending. The same thing goes for its pepper chocolate cream cold foam — made by simply adding pumps of peppermint syrup and chocolate malt powder — as well as the lavender cold foam, which gets its purple hue from the addition of Starbucks' lavender powder. Knowing this, customers can virtually add or substitute any of the flavors on the menu in their cold foam orders. But, you can also choose to substitute oat milk for the cream to create a dairy-free cold foam.