Seasonal Spice of Life: Make Your Own Iced Matcha Green Tea Latte

For months now I have been going to Peet's Coffee. Strangely I don't like coffee so never before did I have those kind of wallet breaking addictions. I went in one day for my boss and came out trying an Iced Matcha Latte. I have to say "Non-fat, non-sweetened, light ice" because for one, I hate sweetened drinks especially with green tea. Two, if you don't say light ice you spend $4.20 for a large cup of ice with 3 sips of the yummy drink. Three, the non-fat milk is sweet enough on it's own, adds no fat to my day and tastes better with the matcha than 2%. It has a stronger flavor this way. Seriously, if you are a green tea, matcha flavor everything fanatic like me that's what you want.

So the problem lies in the fact that if I want to buy these things 4 times a week that's about $20 a week at least on this one drink. The last time I got it (I love Peet's they have great customer service but this one location is hard of hearing at times) I got it sweetened for the second time. Which is a waste of $4.20 in my eyes, and I could not return to the store to get a new one since I had to run back to work.

So my curiosity to see if I could make my own drove me to go to a local Japanese super market called Nijiya in San Mateo, CA. Some of the best sushi there ever I swear! Of course they also have matcha powder cheaper than you would get at a tea place like David's or Teavan (again, great places if you want the best but I'm on a budget). They had a lower cooking grade matcha for $6.99, wasn't sure if that would work so I went for the "universal" matcha for $8.99. That's $8.99 for 1oz of matcha. I'm thinking of trying the cooking grade I think it will work fine.

For every 8oz of milk you need 1 tsp of matcha, so with 1oz container you will get 6 matcha latte's. Say you bought a gallon of milk (I get free milk at work luck me) the milk was $4.50, the matcha is $8.99 that's $13.49 for 6 matcha latte's vs $25.20 matcha latte's being made for you at a store. Over a month if I had 6 latte's a month that would total $100.80 at the store ($100 for drinks over a month! wow!) and $53.96 making my own.

Here's the best part. This recipe is SUPER easy, fast to make and can be done at home or work. All you need is milk (any kind you prefer even soy and almond), matcha powder and a blender or bullet of some kind.