Almond, Coconut, Or Soy: Which Non-Dairy Milk Tastes Better In Iced Coffee?

The milk station at your local coffee shop is getting crowded. Where there used to be a few options—whole, half-and-half, and soy, if you were in a certain neighborhood—there's now a gang of beaked metal birds holding anything from coconut milk to almond milk to rice milk to oat milk to hemp milk to pea milk.

While you may have a specific attraction to one type—almond if you're allergic to soy, rice if you're allergic to nuts, oats if you're concerned about water usage—how do the non-dairy milks stack-up in terms of flavor and texture when stirred into your coffee?

Our friends at Food52 sampled cold brew mixed with four types of milk—soy, almond, rice, and coconut—to see how they compared. Here are their tasting notes:

We couldn't quite reach a consensus on the non-dairy milk of preference: Almond milk (especially since we used a vanilla-flavored version) made the coffee sweet and drinkable, while rice milk was less overpowering, allowing the coffee's flavor to come through. Soy milk made the coffee rich and thick, to the point of being "mouth-coaty," while coconut milk was more watery and did not interfere with the acidity of the coffee.

Words by Sarah Jampel at Food52

[Photo via @florasandfleurs]