My Go-To Options at Starbucks

As I mentioned in my August blog, I’m back greeting customers, making latte art and blending frappuccinos at Starbucks.

I absolutely love the combination of crafting beverages, customer interactions, and the great group of partners that I get to work with.

I will say the benefits of Starbucks coffee and food is certainly a plus as well.

With all the time I’ve spent at work, I definitely have come up with some of my favorite healthier food and drink options and I’m looking forward to continuing to become creative during my time at work.

I thought I would compile some of my favorite go-to drink and food options available at Starbucks.

I’m pretty boring when it comes to drinks honestly, so I will start off with my favorite food options. Total disclaimer in the fact I don’t like sausage or bacon either, so my options tend to be limited, but I can eat any of these items daily and never get tired of them which honestly surprises me because food burnout is so easy.

Spinach Feta Wrap

If you know me.. you know I am absolutely obsessed with the Spinach Feta Wrap. I could eat this every day and never ever ever get sick of it. It’s so good and has such a great balance of protein, fats, and carbs to keep your blood sugars balanced, health goals on-point and fulfilled for a few hours.

Egg White and Roasted Red Pepper Bites

I love to eat these a lot on days when I only have a 10 minute break. I also happened to pack them for work at Disney and stored them in the fridge. I’m always looking for ways to get in more veggies and more protein, so these are a great quick option.

Egg White and Roasted Red Pepper Bites with Avocado Spread.

One thing about Starbucks that I feel like not a lot of people know we have is avocado spread. The avocado spread is so good on so many things. I like to mix the avocado spread with my egg white bites for some added density to my meal. This is a creative combo I came up with one evening at work when we were out of most foods. My jaw was in-pain so I didn’t want Chick-Fil-A, and I knew I needed something a bit more sustaining than just egg white bites.

Kale and Portobello Mushroom Egg Bites

My relationship with eggs is very interesting..I hate any-type of eggs that aren’t cooked into things, so I genuinely thought I would hate these but they are actually super tasty and I love the fact they have portobello mushrooms in them. I swear you can’t taste the kale either.

Bagels with Avocado spread

Avocado toast elevated with a bagel! I had zero expectations for Starbucks bagels since I am from New York, but they are genuinely one of the better chain bagels I’ve ever had. I just definitely recommend getting them warmed or toasting them yourself at home. Unfortunately the sprouted grain bagel is no longer on the menu, but I love having an everything or plain bagel with avocado spread.

My lunchbox one day on the way to a long day in the Confectionary. I likely grabbed an extra avocado spread for the following day. I called it meal prepping with Starbucks.

Bagels with Cream Cheese

I’m a total cream cheese girl, so I think a bagel with cream cheese is always a great way to go as well. I’ll be waiting for when we can get some fun cream cheese flavors like pumpkin for fall launch… maybe 2023? Also here for a pumpkin bagel or something?

Blueberry Muffin

Is it the healthiest option? No, but what fun is life if you only order the healthiest things. This is my dad’s favorite thing from Starbucks and on his birthday earlier this year I surprised him by having a blueberry muffin with him. Now it has so much meaning and I’ll gladly do more blueberry muffin dates with him.

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffin

Pumpkin muffins are my favorite treat. The reason this is actually lower on my list is because the sweetened cream cheese is just a bit too sweet for me personally, so I eat around the cream cheese. I just genuinely don’t have too much of a sweet tooth. However, muffins are my favorite bakery treat for sure and who knows maybe this fall season I'll have a bit more of a sweet tooth.

Now onto those drinks…

I’m pretty big into having a plain dark roast black coffee to start my day or a plain cold brew or black iced coffee. Basically, I like my coffee strong. So my coffee tastes aren’t going to be super appealing to you if you hate the taste of coffee. However, I do enjoy a fun afternoon coffee once in a while.

Dark Roast Coffee (Specifically the christmas/holiday blend)

If it’s my morning coffee… it’s going to be a hot dark roast coffee. The Christmas and holiday blends are my absolute favorite. I stock up big time when the holiday launch comes out. At home we brew the French roast or Verona most mornings.

Triple shot of Espresso over Ice

I’ll share this hack multiple times because It's so good and an easy way to add protein into your day. I love ordering a triple or double shot of espresso with extra ice and adding my protein shake of choice to it. I typically gear towards a chocolate flavor, but I also do this with vanilla. I use Iconic protein shakes the most with this hack, but I have used OWYN protein shakes as well. OWYN shakes are vegan, and the Iconic shakes are lactose-free!

Cold Brew

I’m definitely team cold brew over iced coffee. It’s certainly not as bitter or watered down as the iced coffee is. I also genuinely enjoy a nice nitro cold brew. The nitro does not come with ice and can only be served in a tall or grande cup.

Steamed Cold Brew

I almost didn’t advertise this one because it's very unique, weird and I hope barista’s don’t mind haha, but it's super simple to make. My co-worker came up with this and I absolutely love it. You pour cold brew in the steamer cup and steam it to make a foamy hot drink. I almost forgot about this one until I came home for my graduation weekend and visited my Starbucks location, and one of my partners just made it for me automatically. (Did I mention I work with a great crew?)

Iced Triple Almond Milk Latte with a Banana Blended.

This is definitely another unique option, but I really just wanted a smoothie one morning and the blenders were dead so I decided to make this for my break. I made a triple shot grande iced almond milk latte with extra ice and a banana with cinnamon powder and blended it. It was definitely a very coffee banana drink, but I genuinely loved it. For added sweetness, I suggest adding a syrup of choice. I actually want to try this with pumpkin spice syrup and pumpkin spice topping during the fall.

Pumpkin Cream Cold Brew (No Vanilla Syrup)

The best drink to ever exist. I genuinely don’t like super sweet coffee, so I just omit the vanilla syrup added into the drink itself. The pumpkin sweet cream foam is sweet enough for me and packs the perfect amount of pumpkin flavor.

1 pump Grande Triple Lattes.

There’s two seasonal syrups I really like; Pumpkin Spice and Sugar Cookie! For pumpkin spice I'll do whatever milk I feel like, 1 pump of pumpkin, add an extra shot and of course whipped cream. For sugar cookie, I use almond milk, add an extra shot and one pump of syrup and of course keep the sprinkles because you need some festivity in your life!

I had nine hours of class and a meeting on red cup day last year (so I was off),but I made sure to visit my Starbucks location for my red cup and a mood booster because my favorite people were working.

Peach Tranquilty Tea

If you're looking for a non-caffeinated drink, the peach tranquility tea is the way to go. This is one of my absolute favorite ways to leave a shift. I always bring a cup of tea home as this one helps calm my stomach, reduces my caffeine from tea, and is just so good.

Drop your Starbucks questions and favorite orders in the comments section, and let me know what other chain places you would like to see my favorites for!