Orange coffee is basically black coffee with sugar but instead of adding creamer or milk, you add in orange juice. My concoction uses commercial powdered orange juice and I have yet to try it with commercial liquid orange juice or real freshly-squeezed orange juice. I hypothesize there won’t be much difference in taste with either powder or liquid orange juice but I bet orange coffee will be “stronger” and “tangier” if freshly-squeezed orange juice was used.
How I came up with this coffee blend is no Starbucks-inspired story.
I think it was last year when I first came up with this weird combination. Tired of the usual taste of black coffee and coffee with cream or milk, I espied the Tang orange juice container in the cupboard in the office pantry and asked myself what would coffee taste like if I added in orange juice? To answer the question, I added three teaspoons of orange juice into the coffee I was making and voila – orange coffee!
What does it look like?
Orange coffee looks like ordinary coffee with a hint of cream -- it’s not entirely black in colour like regular black coffee but more brown-black. And like cappuccino, the surface develops froth-like swirls which later on disappear as you start drinking it.
How does it smell?
Orange coffee, for obvious reasons, smells citrus-like. You smell the aroma of coffee but you also smell the tanginess of the orange ingredient. It’s not offensive to the olfactory nerves except if you hate the smell of orange or citrus.
And how does it taste?
When you take your first sip of the orange coffee, it feels as though you’re drinking regular sweetened black coffee. However, as you gulp it down, you’ll start to taste the orangey flavour and then you feel the tanginess of orange at your throat. Adding more orange juice though results in a mixed sour, sweet, tangy taste right from the second you sip the coffee.
Word of caution though, if you’re using Pinoy-customized orange juice like the Eight O’ Clock brand, best cut down on the sugar you put into your coffee because the result is a sweet-tooth attack. I did this at home and wasn’t able to finish my mug because it was too damning sweet. Tang, which is less sweet than the Eight O’ Clock brand, is a better option for orange coffee.
I’ve tried this concoction with both brewed (Starbucks granules) and your ole Nescafe Classic blend and they taste ok but I don’t know if I can say the same if I do this blend using Batangas brew – Kape Barako.
