Make Your Own Latte – Without A Machine

I’ve always loved coffee. Both of my 
parents detest it, so it was never available while I was growing up. It wasn’t until I left home that I was able to have a cup every day, and it was great!

We never had a fancy coffee maker after we got married, especially since it was only my habit – Andy didn’t drink it then. We had the typical percolating machine, and then when we realized we would be moving to Alaska we scaled down further. Did you know that coffee makers take a horrendous amount of electricity to operate? We knew we’d be off grid so we bought a cheap little stovetop percolator off Amazon for around $25.

Problem was, the percolator inside didn’t percolate right, and the first few tries the coffee tasted like a rubber balloon. Not good.

We ended up getting creative and just making cowboy coffee. Coffee making is actually very simple, much like tea. Just boil water, add grounds, steep for five to ten minutes and strain. It’s our modern day coffee makers that make the whole process seem mysterious and complicated.

We made coffee that way for two years, and it suited us fine. There were always some grounds that settled to the bottom of the cup, so we just didn’t drink the whole way to the bottom of the mug.

Then for my birthday in January Andy surprised me with a stainless steel French press. Wonderful!! I buy cheap coffee grounds, but the French press really smooths out the flavor and helped it not be bitter.

I love lattes as well, but at $5.00 a pop up here (not including tip!) it is a rare treat to buy one. Starting with cowboy coffee, I learned to make my own latte here at home. I’ve never had much success doing it with percolated coffee from an electric coffee maker because it doesn’t get strong enough. If you make cowboy coffee, just add double the amount of grounds and let it steep around 7-10 minutes. This makes much stronger coffee and resembles the espresso in a latte.

Homemade Lattes

Boil 2 cups of water. Either put it in your French press with 5-6 Tablespoons coffee grounds, or just add that amount of grounds to the pan and put on the lid.

While it steeps, pick out your coffee mug and fill 1/4-1/3 with milk, depending on how much steamed milk you like. Pour the milk into a saucepan and add a spoonful of butter. This adds a lot of rich flavor to your latte. Heat the milk and butter on high heat until it is steaming hot. Pour into the blender (or for die-hards who want to go electric free you can also shake it in a jar to get the milk frothy.) Blend for 1 minute.

Add 2-4 drops of flavor to the bottom of your mug – vanilla, peppermint or maple extracts work well, and sweetener. I usually make mine with stevia, but you can also use 1-1 1/2 Tablespoons of sugar depending on the mug size and how sweet you like your coffee.

Once you have your sweetener and flavor added, pour the coffee into the cup until it reaches the 3/4 full mark. Make sure to strain out the grounds if you’re using cowboy coffee! Pour the steamed milk in slowly and the foam should come out last, leaving you a nice froth on the top!

I still haven’t figured out how to make coffee art, but maybe one day I’ll be able to do cool designs on top of my homemade lattes. Honestly I like my homemade ones better than some of the coffee shop lattes I’ve had!

Try it out and let me know in the comments how it turned out for you!

P.S. This was an awesome blog post to write because I had to make a latte to get pics for the recipe. Best Blogpost Ever! Now please excuse me while I try to find a safe spot to drink my latte without kiddos spilling it!