Iced Lavender Flavour Matcha Tea Latte @ Starbucks
I thought, if I already reviewed one drink made by a franchise before on this blog, why not another?
I do have to mention though that it's a bit different than my other reviews on here. In the others, I try to look for quality and being able to thoroughly experience and enjoy the pure matcha or matcha lattes, how well it tastes and the powder looks and feels.
This one is more about the drink experience a company offers. I don't know their supplier or powder quality. Also, it's a drink for enjoyment mixed with syrup and milk, so it's a review of a drink featuring matcha, not about the matcha in it that you can only taste within everything it is mixed with :)
General Info
This is a new drink offered by Starbucks in Germany. They first pump lavender syrup into the cup, mix in your milk of choice (in my case, oat milk) and ice, and then pour pre-mixed matcha liquid into the cup on top. The lavender is on the bottom, the matcha is on the top.
This is a different product than what people in the US probably have had since last year, where they make you a matcha with a lavender cold foam on top. The cold foam stuff always has dairy, but the one I review where they just use syrup can be had without dairy.
By the way, if you have also noticed a change in your Starbucks matcha, you're right: They changed their matcha from pre-sweetened to unsweetened and the new matcha powder clumps harder. They used to mix it fresh and the old powder worked well with that, but the new powder clumped with the old process (had 2 clumpy ones too). Now my store and many other stores switched to having it prepared in a special container already where it is nicely blended beforehand.
Taste
I was nervous to try it, because so far, I never liked anything with supposed lavender taste, but I'm actually happy with this one. It predominately tastes sweet, so it could potentially be too sweet for some, but also has a very floral taste. I'd say the syrup is like as if you made a juice out of lavender. I recommend really making sure you stir and shake a bit or change how deep you plunge the straw in so the matcha has properly mixed with the sweet-flowery taste so it is neither just matcha or just flowery-sweet.
I have to say, I generally like Starbucks' matcha, even the new one; it always has a radiant and intense colour, it can both stand on its own and be accompanied by other flavours (this is tricky to get right in my experience; you do need a bold flavor if it is supposed to be tasted against other ingredients, but it can't just be too bold to enjoy by itself. Having it be very bitter sticks out in very sweet ingredients, but no one wants a very bitter plain matcha latte). Here, I think it complements the lavender well and vice versa, instead of being drowned out. It's bold without being very astringent, it has body without really having much umami. It could be nuttier in general in a plain matcha latte, but makes sense why they don't do that. It would be too expensive and kind of sad for a really high quality, high umami matcha to be drowned out by syrup. I also think a nuttier matcha would have clashed with the lavender.
Together, I think they make a great and fun team, and the initial gradient looks so cute.
Conclusion
๐ต๐ต๐ต๐ต๐ต 5 out of 5 matcha bowls.