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Meg tries out Starbucks Japan’s newest treat: the White Brew Coffee and Macadamia Frappuccino

Casey Baseel Mar 16, 2018
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White coffee dessert drink appears in the land of green tea, and Meg finds there’s more than just the color to love.

Every year in March 14, Japan celebrates White Day, when women get return/thank-you gifts for the chocolate they gave to boyfriends and male coworkers on Valentine’s Day. But this year, there was a “white day” of a separate sort taking place on March 15, when Starbucks Japan debuted its brand-new White Brew Coffee and Macadamia Frappuccino.

We’d had this day circled on our to-eat-and-drink calendar since we first heard about it, and drawing the taste-test assignment this time was Frappuccino fan and Japanese-language SoraNews24 correspondent Meg.

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A post shared by 沢井メグ（Meg　Sawai） (@megmi381)

As you’ve no doubt guessed from its name, the White Brew Coffee and Macadamia Frappuccino is pure white in color, practically looking like a solid cup of whipped cream. It’s so snowy in hue that Meg was honestly a little doubtful of whether it could deliver on the “coffee” part of the product-name promise.

But all those fears were allayed when she took her first sip, and her taste buds were introduced to a rich yet smooth coffee sensation!

▼ “You can really taste the coffee!” Meg tells us in her notes.

So how is this visual/gustatory divergence possible? The White Brew Coffee and Macadamia Frappuccino (which is priced at 590 yen [US$5.50] for a tall size) is made with espresso milk, which is in turn made by soaking roasted coffee beans in milk for 14 hours, which allows the oil from the beans surface to mix with the milk, imparting it with flavorful coffee notes without passing on any significant astringency. Each Starbucks Japan branch whips up its own espresso milk in-store, and Meg says the final product is like drinking a café au lait but without any trace of harsh bitterness.

Shifting focus to the other marque ingredient, while the White Brew Coffee and Macadamia Frappuccino looks creamy, there’s actually some satisfying grit to its texture, thanks to the bits of macadamia nuts mixed into the beverage.

Aside from its great taste, Meg found one other thing to love about the newest member of the Starbucks menu. With a cup of normal coffee, you’re getting about 60 milligrams of caffeine per 100 milliliters (3.4 ounces) of beverage. Since a tall-size Starbucks drink is 350 milliliters, that would work out to about 210 milligrams. The tall White Brew Coffee and Macadamia Frappuccino, though, has just 13 milligrams of caffeine, a practically negligible amount, making it a great choice for satisfying your coffee-flavor cravings if you still want to keep your caffeine intake down.

Reference: All Japan Coffee Association
Photos ©SoraNews24
[ Read in Japanese ]