Starbucks, Friend or Foe?

We all love it, you know, that five dollar cup of calories, that frothy sweet liquefied heart-attack that no one can resist. However, you may be being duped and hurt by some parts of Starbucks you didn't even think of... Here are some sneaky ways that the consumer suffers at Starbucks

1. WHIPPED CREAM

Ok, so you know its bad for you, but its just so darn good. Whipped cream is the frothy, fluffy, smooth, dreamy topping on practically every drink. Sure there are days when you say no whip, but there are those when you wish you could have four times the whip. But how bad is it really?

Here's an idea, one dollop of whipped cream, (i.e. what's on you coffee cup) has the saturated fats of SEVEN pieces of bacon.

If you look up the calories, its only around 82, but the thing is that 68 of those calories are from fat. That over 80% which is a lot.

Plus whipped cream has about 31g of cholesterol in each dollop.

What is one to do when whipped cream is soooooo delicious? Well, one way to get the same affect as the frothy cream would be to ask for extra foam. It's not the same obviously, but it's a whole lot closer to whipped cream than just your regular latte. The froth is just made with a frother in your latte, so no extra cream or fats added.

2. THE CUP CRISIS

There's been a lot of talk lately about Starbucks' cup sizes. The fact is, a lot of people don't really know how the sizes go. THIS IS THE ORDER:

a TALL at Starbucks is a SMALL anywhere else (twelve ounces)

GRANDE is MEDIUM (sixteen ounces)

and VENTI is LARGE (twenty ounces)

A fair amount of people may know these three main stream sizes, however did you know that there are other sizes too?

A DEMI is the smallest size and is only for espresso drinks. It is three fluid ounces, which seems tiny. However, it is pure shots, so its the same amount of coffee as a tall, only with no milk. Much healthier, but much more wince-inducing.

A SHORT is eight fluid ounces and is not advertised on the Starbucks menu, but I've seen it ordered many times. It's the original Starbucks small, and it's not advertised probably because Tall, Grande, and Venti are much more popular. It's only about thirty cents less than the tall, but four ounces less fluid.

A TRENTE is the biggest size, at a whopping thrity one ounces! It is generally used for iced teas or iced tea-lemonades. It looks similar to a bucket...but hey, if you want it, it's there.

FUN FACT: The reason that these sizes are so weird is because Starbucks originally only had two sizes, the short and the tall. Obviously, the short was the small and the tall the large. Then, from demand, they made a larger size. Since the bigger size was obviously the biggest, they called it a Grande. However, as sizes from competitors got bigger and bigger, they had to make an even larger size. What does one call something bigger than the Grande? They called it a Venti, since it has twenty ounces of coffee.

3. THE SOY SOLUTION

The other thing about Starbucks is that they charge you extra for soy milk, which has as many calories as nonfat milk, but is a lot healthier, EVEN THOUGH soy milk is cheaper than actual milk. Why should the consumer pay extra for something that is cheaper, shouldn't they get a discount instead? Soy milk is a solution to many for the huge calorie intake that comes with a Starbucks drink. It can reduce the total calories in a drink by over 100 calories most of the time.

This is only complicated by the fact that Soy milk used to be free with a Gold Card. And now with the new Gold Rewards, it is no longer free.