making drinks from coffee talk
Coffee Talk 1 and 2 are some of my favorite games. You play a barista that makes drinks for the customers who come in and tell you about their day. You make the drinks by combining different ingredients in a specific order by putting them into three slots; an espresso would be made by putting Coffee into all three slots, for example. It's in a pixel art, Visual Novel style with some lofi music. I loved to sit in my bed all cozy with some nice beverages of my own and play.
A year ago, I had the idea to make the drinks myself to try them out. Some of the drinks seem pretty boring or standard when you look at what the game requires as recipe, but I was curious to research what they actually require and to use real life recipes if applicable. Teh Tarik for example only requires tea and milk ingame, but in real life it is made with Ceylon tea (black tea), condensed milk and salt, and also poured between cups up to five times to aerate it. Sometimes, the characters also say something about how the drink is made that is not actually included in the ingame recipe - for example, the player character says they add cardamom into the Shai Adeni, but the game recipe actually only requires tea, milk, and cinnamon.
So I tried to strike a balance between what the game or characters said and what the real life recipes require and also tried to replicate the look of the ingame pixel art as best as I could. I am not a barista (sadly), so I suck at latte art, but I tried my best.
Sidenote: When the recipe requires milk, I use oat milk. When it requires honey, I use coconut syrup or maple syrup. For black tea, I use Assam tea. I use decaf coffee and the chocolate drinks are taste-tested by my girlfriend, because my body sadly doesn't tolerate chocolate well.
So here they are, in no particular order:
Shai Adeni
Ingame recipe: Tea, Milk, Cinnamon
Real life recipe: black tea, (condensed) milk, cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg
Origin: Yemeni tea from the coastal city of Aden
I liked this one. I was a bit lazy and brewed my black milk tea as usual and then added the spices; if you want to make it like it is traditionally made, you'd heat up the spices with water in a sauce pan, then add the black tea leaves, then later on add the condensed milk before pouring it into a cup.
Marrakech
Ingame recipe: Green Tea, Mint, Mint
Real life recipe: n/a
Origin: Morocco ?
I haven't found a real life recipe or origin for this drink, the ingame description says it is a refreshing drink from Morocco. I researched a bit on how others and the developers of the game (Toge Productions) made Coffee Talk drinks featuring mint since just adding a bag of peppermint tea doesn't quite have the same taste or effect (or is downright weird with some coffee drinks) but some fresh leaves might be too little. I saw that some opt to use mint syrup, so I did as well. I accidentally made it with milk (because I'm so used to making myself matcha latte) so it's not entirely accurate, but it was still very tasty!
Pink Spice
Ingame recipe: Hibiscus, Milk, Cinnamon
Real life recipe: n/a
Origin: n/a
This is one of the made up teas in the game and it tasted awful. It just tasted like vomit. But it looked pretty!
Five Stars
Ingame recipe: Green Tea, Honey, Milk
Real life recipe: n/a
Origin: n/a
This one is also invented by the game and for a specific game event and achievement. I really tried with the latte art, but it was impossible, oops. But it was tasty!
Bitter Heart
Ingame recipe: Chocolate, Ginger, Cinnamon
Real life recipe: n/a
Origin: n/a
I made this one for my girlfriend as a surprise. I cut up the ginger first, let it steep together with the cinnamon in boiling water, then added the chocolate milk. She really liked it and said the spice from the ginger is subtle, but still enough to add to the drink so it doesn't just taste like cinnamon chocolate.
I will be making more of them soon, so stay tuned for another post.