Customized coffee drinks have gone viral – and may be a recipe for disaster – AHA

I must admit that I love drinking coffee, particularly lattes and cappuccinos. Until I got my own machine, I have had a hard time passing up a Starbucks. However, while I put sugar into my drinks, that is the extent of my ‘add ons.’ I am fully aware of how calorie-heavy some of the amped up coffee drinks can be.

One order, for example – which already featured syrupy caramel blended with coffee and topped with caramel sugar – had a laundry list of add-ons that included extra caramel drizzle, whipped and heavy cream, cinnamon syrup and seven pumps of dark caramel.

Now, nutrition experts are hoping to have their say about the consequences of this syrup-pumping, cream-swapping fad: “It makes me cringe,” said Marie-Pierre St-Onge, an associate professor of nutritional medicine at Columbia University in New York. “It’s a bad habit to start, that’s for sure.”

For starters, St-Onge said, customers should use caution when they order coffee drinks, tea or other popular, sugary beverages straight from the menu at their favorite establishments because they already may contain empty calories. The ingredient substitutions and add-ons can only make matters worse.