How to Make a Homemade Latte on the Cheap
With espresso and latte machines costing upwards of $50, I decided to try and make my own Starbucks style Vanilla Latte at home. This methods works pretty well and is much less expensive. All you need is hot milk, coffee, vanilla extract and a bit of sugar. The recipe assumes a 16oz. mug (2 cups).
- Start a double-strong batch of coffee. You only need about 3/4 of a cup.
- While the coffee is brewing, heat 1-1/4 cups of milk until it is almost boiling. (I put mine in the microwave for 3 minutes.)
- Pour hot milk, coffee, 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract and about 1 tablespoon of sugar into a blender and blend on high. This will froth the milk and help give the latte that foamy, creamy texture. If you don't have a blender, egg beaters will work just fine.
- It's as easy as that. Enjoy!
*Note: If you use instant coffee or want to make a Chai latte with the powered mix, you can use a full mug of hot milk and just put the instant coffee or Chai mix into the blender with it for similarly spectacular results.
At 1:18 PM on April 9, 2007, Keacher said,
Have you tried using a regular whisk to froth the milk, or would that be too large to work effectively?
At 4:14 PM on April 9, 2007, Tyler said,
I'll give it a try and let you know how it compares.
At 6:41 PM on April 9, 2007, Lone Wolf said,
I'll try this to see how it compares to the $19 espresso machine I bought at WalMart.
At 6:53 PM on April 9, 2007, Lone Wolf said,
OK, I am back. Seems to work OK. I am using real espresso from the machine, and adding the milk to the coffee rather than blending the mix, but the blender method does seem to make the milk more frothy than the traditional steam method.
At 12:48 PM on April 11, 2007, Tyler said,
@Keacher - The whisk worked pretty well. It didn't froth quite as much, but it got the job done.
@Lone Wolf - Thanks for doing a side-by-side, I'm happy to hear that this recipe does a decent job.
At 3:21 PM on January 31, 2008, d-_-b said,
this is awesome! i have tried for years to make 'road-lattes' from gas station fixin's but could never get the foam just right (sometimes not at all considering sometimes i used powdered creamer and hot water for 'milk'). finally i decided to keep a shaker-cup handy and that worked really well. maybe this would work for your method in case you are without a blender or electricity.