We’ll all remember May 31st, 2016 as the day we reached the cold brew singularity. Yesterday, Starbucks officially announced the launch of their nitro cold brew on tap, to be released in 500 stores across the United States by the end of the summer. Close your eyes with holy dread, for we on the nitro brew hath fed.
For those unaware of what exactly this now ubiquitous beverage is, the Starbucks press release has your back:
Cold brew coffee and nitrogen, a pour perfected by pulling a tap. Perfect. A tall is said to cost around $4.00 and has only five calories and zero grams of sugar. That’s 80 cents a calorie, which seems like a lot. But it really isn’t when you consider this is “an entirely new cold coffee experience,” something repeated verbatim by Starbucks CEO and Chairman Howard Schultz in a different press release, so you know they mean it.
Nitro cold brew isn’t exactly a new release for the Big Green Machine, though; it is already offered at the Starbucks Reserve and a few other Starbucks across Seattle. But the announcement of the nationwide campaign is pretty big news that has certainly riled up not only the coffee community but the world at large. Hell, even Buzzfeed plopped out a gif’ed out, infograph-tastic piece for those who want to “read” an article, just not the words. For press release rebloggers in the mainstream media or those nursing slow news days, it’s a big deal. For the rest of us, meh.
However, Starbucks has also released a “sweet cream cold brew” with a far different calorie metric. It sounds potentially delicious, but also potentially gross. My interest is piqued, and this story is developing…
Zac Cadwalader is the news editor at Sprudge Media Network.
*gif via of Starbucks
