Almond or coconut: That is the question.
Starbucks and Dunkin’ Donuts, the country’s two coffee giants, have placed their flags in different camps when it comes to dairy-free milk alternatives.
A week after Dunkin’ Donuts started offering almond milk at most of its domestic locations, Starbucks expanded its coconut milk test.
It’s still a fairly small test. According to Reuters, coconut milk is available in Starbucks locations in Los Angeles, Cleveland and Oregon.
Starbucks fan site Starbucks Melody says this new round of testing follows on the heels of one six months ago in Everett, Wash., and San Diego.
“The fact that the test has expanded to a larger area is very promising!” Melody said, although she herself is not a fan of non-dairy milk.
“I wouldn’t order a coconut milk latte twice,” she said after trying it and finding it watery and too bubbly, although she did report that Portland, Ore., operators said it was a hit in Frappuccinos.
According to Starbucks Melody, locations testing coconut milk were offering it for the same surcharge as soy milk, which varies by location.
Celebrity personal trainer Jillian Michaels has long wanted Starbucks to offer coconut milk. She stated so in a Facebook post in early 2011 that criticized soy and extolled the virtues of coconut milk as being “great for the planet and our health.”
One of Michaels’ beefs with soy milk was that it was made from genetically modified organisms, but Foodbeast noted that Starbucks’ soy milk, offered since 1997, is organic and thus by definition GMO-free.
Almond milk, which, as Eater points out, has a Facebook page of fans who want Starbucks to offer it, isn’t on the table. Reuters quoted a Starbucks spokeswoman as saying the popular nut milk — now the most popular dairy substitute, according to Nielsen Product Movement data — put the safety of customers with nut allergies at risk.
Contact Bret Thorn at [email protected].
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