Calorie counting has begun to show me just how many foods and drinks are just so incredibly calorie dense. Like, what do you mean my favorite Starbucks drink has more calories than my air fried chicken and white rice lunch 😭. You're telling me a single Reese's cup has almost as much calories as my rice cake and yogurt breakfast??
The loss of my beloveds may kill me, but I will persevere all the same, lol.
by EllorenMellowren
34 Comments
I’ve invested in sugar free syrups, low cal creamers and 0 calorie sweeteners to make my own iced coffees. Frappes are great for a once in a while treat but I can have a low cal coffee everyday and not feel deprived.
I KNOOOOOW!
I literally just mentioned in another comment about how much I miss my 1000 cal venti iced coffee monstrosities. When I first started calorie counting, I was so confused cause I was only eating about 800 cals a day. Then I looked up the cals in my normal several times a week beverage and was like “Oh…. there it is.”
I do get a short or tall coffee every now and then, their brown sugar cortado is so good and only about 130 calories!
Honestly, I normally refer to Starbucks drinks or other random snacks like a candy bar to explain to other people how *easy* it is to over eat, especially to people judging. Like all it takes is one “extra” thing a day and bam, one pound gained each week. It’s so sad. 😭
Starbucks specialize in coffee flavored milkshakes. Thats what they are. You can still have these, but make it an event and have bulk vegetables with protiens the rest of the day to compensate. I always have one pumpkin spice Frappuccino a year.
If you haven’t seen the show Secret Eaters yet, it will blow your mind. It’s a reality show in the UK where overweight people say they don’t understand how they’ve gained so much weight because they’re not eating very much. Then they get followed around for a week with hidden cameras and it always turns out they are eating WAY MORE than they thought because they don’t know the calories of things. Watching it helps me stay on track. It’s honestly insane how caloric a lot of foods are and how easily you can be eating 3k-5k calories a day without even feeling that full or thinking you’re eating terribly poorly.
Yup! I had to stop going to Starbucks. I love it but can’t afford the calories and the temptation.
I remember being shocked too! I haven’t ordered any high calorie drinks there since 😅
You can make changes to have this as an occasional treat. Nonfat milk, tall size, no whip, less syrup, no crunch topping, and less caramel.
Or just indulge as a special occasion thing, like when it’s your Birthday. I would only do this once you can control yourself and not spiral into a trash disposal of eating all the things.
I may be giving unsolicited advice here, BUT. It’s delicious.
I love iced coffee. I make mine now with 6oz cold brew, 1 Fairlife vanilla shake and a pitch of cinnamon.
26g of protein and 170 calories. 10/10
One of my rules is I refuse to drink my calories unless it’s alcohol lol.
But also, keep in mind that losing weight is a marathon and not a sprint. If you need to treat yourself to this drink once or twice a month to stay motivated, then go for it. Life is too short to deny ourselves simple pleasures.
I usually get cold brew with almond milk with sugar free vanilla as it’s less than 35kcal for a venti, but if i’m looking for something really sweet, I get a blonde iced caffè latte with almond milk which is around 130kcal and that does the job for me. Also if the ice starts to melt in the coffee, adding a ‘virtually zero’ type vanilla/french vanilla syrup to add more sweetness may help 🙂
Edit: The calorie info for the 130 is for a Grande and in the UK it may be different in other areas.
The iced blonde latte is my second favorite drink from StarBs. Nowhere near as yummy as the frappe, but still something sweet to keep me going from time to time 💪🏾
At least coffee is an appetite supressant. When I have them I sip throughout the day as a meal replacement
When I worked there, we had multiple customers who would come in and get Frappuccinos or extra-caramel macchiatos *every day* (sometimes twice a day) and so many of them were stick-thin. I don’t understand it. Did they just not eat anything else? Did they run marathons every day? Did they free a genie and wish for zero calories from all coffee beverages?
Yes and my favorite candy pecan turtles is like 200 calories a piece 🐢
Imagine all the money you’ll be saving too by cutting this out. My go to is a grand iced green tea latte with 1/2 pump of syrup and add vanilla cold foam. That shit cost me $10 CAD!
I have seen the description ‘liquid cake’ often thrown around for starbucks drinks.
Frappacinos are a high calorie dessert, not a coffee drink.
switch to almond or coconut milk. typically reduces 100 calories on its own
I will not give up my Starbucks. I just swap to no fat milk, no whip and tall. Eventually your tastes do adjust and you’ll find a standard drink way too sweet. The beauty of cico is you can still have Starbucks, just less calories elsewhere in your day.
when i found out a normal slice of cake was around 600-800 calories… 😭 i don’t think my life was the same after that
It also has SIXTY GRAMS OF SUGAR.
If you have a blender you can make this at home. Look up a recipe and sub with 0 cal/sugar caramel sauce, sugar free syrup, 0 sugar or fat free reddi whip.
I started making my own homemade frappes
It’s unlikely they’ll ever be low calorie even making them at home but I use a less than a fraction of the sugar and just recently I made a dry mix that I use. (Makes it easy to portion)
I used this recipe but I only had powdered sugar and no creamer.
A tad unsweet but I think that’s how it should behttps://justfowlingaround.weebly.com/recipes-for-self-reliance/make-your-own-frappe-mix
And I mixed into milk and blended with a pinch of can than gum (important for consistency.) and I got a store quality Frappucino
I used Cafe Bustelo instant espresso and re ground it into powder
Was pretty good👍
To make it more low calorie use less sugar and/or less milk and opt for water. It does have dry milk after all
A teaspoon and half a glass of milk was the serving size and base I used. From there I added the ice and Can than gum and blended
The most in question without the creamer as I mentioned took up a whole mason jar.
I started making my own homemade frappes
It’s unlikely they’ll ever be low calorie even making them at home but I use a less than a fraction of the sugar and just recently I made a dry mix that I use. (Makes it easy to portion)
I used this recipe but I only had powdered sugar and no creamer.
A tad unsweet but I think that’s how it should behttps://justfowlingaround.weebly.com/recipes-for-self-reliance/make-your-own-frappe-mix
And I mixed into milk and blended with a pinch of can than gum (important for consistency.) and I got a store quality Frappucino
I used Cafe Bustelo instant espresso and re ground it into powder
Was pretty good👍
To make it more low calorie use less sugar and/or less milk and opt for water. It does have dry milk after all
A teaspoon and half a glass of milk was the serving size and base I used. From there I added the ice and Can than gum and blended
The most in question without the creamer as I mentioned took up a whole mason jar.
Switch to an iced latte with almond milk and a few pumps of caramel syrup to save about 200 calories. No whipped cream too.
It won’t be the same but it’ll help when the craving strikes.
lol yeah Frappuccino = milkshake not coffee
Yeah this is one of the good things about calorie counting even short term. So many of our habits can develop around things we are so ignorant about. For example I used to feel so bad about picking up a donut once in a while. Meanwhile remaining oblivious that the coffee I was having with that donut was actually a lot more calories! So now I find by tweaking my habits just a little I have no guilt or issue going for the occasional sweet treat like a donut.
Even just a few weeks of tracking your calories can teach you so much about the food you consume. And you can begin to decide for yourself which habits you want to keep and which you can part with or tweak.
There is no right or wrong decisions. Everyone is different. But if you educate yourself on what you eat you can make educated decisions for yourself and what works for you and your life.
i feel this but with tim horton’s iced capps :,) you can ask them to make it with 2% milk instead of cream for a lower cal option, but then it’s sad and it doesn’t even mix right
‘drink’ is doing some heavy lifting. Remember, you are being sold an addictive substance packaged to look like confectionery in cup-shaped packaging. Don’t fall for it, don’t have the sugar crash, save on your dentist bills too.
This is exactly why just starting counting calories is the best way to get your health in check. The amount of “empty” calories people consume without being aware of it is staggering.
You can still make these work if you really want them. Some people like sugar free, but honestly if I’m CRAVING something like a peppermint mocha, I’ll ask for a specific number of pumps of the normal stuff. 1-2 is plenty when they normally do 4-8, skim milk, and I get a tall instead of a big size. I view them as a treat I get a couple times a year and honestly once I kicked the habit, I don’t miss them.
Sometimes… i like to do a super heavy exercise dense day that makes having my “favourite” in a small manageable size ok. Life is about balance. If i make too many no no foods i become a no no to life.
When I moved to the states I became a barista and gained 20 lbs in a few months even though the job was very active, with lots of heavy lifting. All because we could drink there for free! I’ve been very conscious of drinking calories since then, and still enjoy something like this but only once a month. I don’t really crave these high calorie sweet drinks anymore