Iced Coffee- A shark potion

   I dont like coffee, never have. During long nights of studying as an undergrad I would try everything at Dunkin' Donuts and Starbucks... but my taste buds resisted all of it. I just resolved that I was never going to be able to use coffee as a normal college student. Then I started grad school, and while I do not spend nearly as much time studying late at night... I am forced to keep my eyes open for 4 hour long classes, which for those who know me understand just how unlikely that is. So I started driving to get those fake cappuccinos from the gas stations. I didn't have time to do that one day so decided to try one of those bottled Starbucks drinks. IT WORKED! I could drink it without holding my nose or chugging it. So it became my new fuel. Since then (about 4 months ago) I have probably spent 70-80 dollars on those darn drinks. As I mentioned I am unable to pay attention for long classes and being a cheep college kid I went online during class today to determine the best way to make the drink myself.

From all the recipies I saw I decided what I thought would make the best combination for the coffee portion, then used some different types of milk to finish the drink off. I expected to go home and experiment with failed trials for a while, but basically nailed it on the first try. So here is exactly what I did, with some suggestions as to what could make it more like the real deal.

Ok so this recipe is pretty darn close to the bottled Starbucks MOCHA frappuccino drink. I am going to try to figure out the vanilla and maybe even caramel at another time.. I'll keep you all posted :)

Mocha Iced Frappuccino Drink

Ingredients
3 Cups Hot Water
4 teaspoons Instant Coffee
1/4 Cup Nesquick chocolate powder
2 Tablespoons Brown Sugar
6 Tablespoons Sweet and Condensed Milk

3/4 Cup Milk
1 1/2 teaspoons cream

Directions
1. Mix instant coffee, chocolate powder, and brown sugar together in a small bowl while heating the water. (you can make it stronger coffee flavor by adding more instant coffee to the mixture, this recipe has a pretty weak coffee flavor)
2. Add the coffee mixture to the hot water and stir to dissolve
3. Add sweet and condensed milk to the coffee mixture. (this is really where it gets all of its sweetness, so if you want it more or less sweet adjust this amount)
Put in a container and store in the refrigerator

When read to serve place 4-5 ice cubes in a cup. Add about equal parts milk and coffee mixture, stir well and add cream. (Here again you can decide how weak/strong you want the coffee flavor by adjusting the milk:coffee ratio)


I used skim milk because that is what I had, and someone that tried it said the flavor was very similar, but that mine was much thinner. So using a milk with higher fat content may yield better results. I also tried making it with vanilla almond milk... but that came out too sweet for me, but am going to try to use it to make the vanilla one since I will me omitting the chocolate powder. Don't leave out the cream unless you really have it, it really changes the entire drink. I don't really know how because it is such a small amount, but it does.

Depending on how sweet and strong you like your coffee you can adjust many things... here is some suggestions to change these two factors...

Increasing the instant coffee or using less milk will make a stronger coffee drink
Decreasing the chocolate powder will make it less sweet and increase the coffee flavor at the expense of chocolate flavor.
I would not mess with the brown sugar
Decreasing the sweet and condensed milk will decrease the sweetness
Using a higher fat content milk will increase the thickness and creaminess of the drink, but will also slightly weaken the coffee flavor.
USE AT LEAST A LITTLE CREAM... even if it is only the first time just so you understand the difference.