Has anyone found a palatable substitute for cream/creamer in coffee?
I can't count how many times I've made up a cup of coffee, only to realize in horror that I don't have any cream/creamer.
This morning I almost reached for margarine in desperation, but I'm still gagging at the thought of it.
I ended up using skim milk instead, but it left a weird taste in the coffee.
Basically anything that the average person might have kicking around the kitchen to add some fat/flavour to black coffee.
Ice cream is always a good option. Vanilla ice cream is probably the most straightforward.
Milk. Can't even imagine why you'd want to put cream (or "creamer", whatever that is) into coffee. If your coffee needs "flavour", I suggest getting better coffee.
There's a whole world of shelf-stable milk products and milk alternatives. Keep one or two on hand for when you run out of fresh milk. Just be sure to rotate your stock, most last a few months.
Trader Joe's sells shelf-stable whipping cream for about $1.50. There's no weird chemicals, it's just milk and carrageenan (a thickener found in many creams) which has been Ultra High Temperature Pasteurized (UHT) and then sealed. Also useful for baking.
Horizon makes single serving UHT milk boxes, like juice boxes, which are shelf stable. At $1 each they're a total rip off, and I've only seen them in 1%, but it's better than nothing. I use them when camping because of the small portion size.
In fact, many of the national organic milk brands in the fridge are UHT. Horizon is one. You can buy a half-gallon of UHT milk and keep it for three months.
Any shelf-stable milk substitute will work. Almond milk, coconut milk, coconut cream, rice milk, etc... Go for the unsweetened varieties, you can always add sweetener.
Evaporated milk comes in cans, so does sweetened condensed milk, and they keep a long time. They're handy for baking.
Buy a box of Mini Moo's, those individual serving creamers you get in diners.
"Bulletproof Coffee" is adding butter and maybe coconut oil to coffee. The nutrition claims are likely a bunch of hooey, but it might cut some of the bitterness.
If you're adding cream to cut the bitterness, try making better coffee. Buy good beans and learn how to make pour over. You can buy fancy equipment, but with a good grinder you can do it on the cheap.
They're all mainly milk options that I can think of, w/ the bold-ed ones being my favorites:
Also, a pinch of salt may reduce the bitterness, allowing you to drink it w/o creamer, YMMV.
Hot chocolate powder can be a good substitute for creamer. It will definitely add some flavor to your coffee. I call it "poor man's mocha".
Coconut oil or unsalted butter! The coconut oil tastes remarkably like coffee creamer, and butter is made from cream; or try putting some of each in and you'd have an ersatz bulletproof coffee!
If you're the baking type you may keep sweetened condensed milk. This makes a very sweet coffee (Skip the sugar!), but it's not at all bad.
I didn't see my answer, so I’m going to tell you about what I put in my coffee every morning.
Unflavored “original” yogurt. Or maybe vanilla flavored.
I use milk too, but I put about a tablespoon or two (I like large silverware) into my coffee and stir it. It makes a nice, thick coffee, similar to what you might get with ice cream. My coffee is iced coffee, and I put chocolate powered and about 4 pumps of torrani syrup in there too. I top it off with ice and then head to work.
This also helps me because I get those probiotics and Jamie Lee Curtis is always talking about. I buy the fancy Greek yogurts that talk about having 100 septillion live cultures, or whatever the highest count is in general, because they are always richer and have a more palatable flavor when mixed with other things.
Off topic, I also use yogurt in my ranch dressing and my Alfredo sauce.
I wouldn't give up on the butter idea so fast -- it is fat after all. Not sure how salted butter's salt would change the taste (maybe even make it better?) After all, frosting would probably work and that's little more than whipped butter with a ton of sugar and some flavor.
Creamer is already a substitute for milk. So if you replace the creamer, replace it with milk.
If you add milk though, it may cool down the coffee much, so you should heat it first. But if you do, make sure you don't boil the milk. Boiling affects the flavor of the milk badly. Make it a lukewarm, so it doesn't cool your coffee down too much, but make sure there are no bubbles.
But I must say, I usually drink my coffee without any creamer or milk. A bit of sugar maybe, but a good coffee doesn't need anything else. :)
