Café au Lait: What Is It and How to Make This Coffee in 2024

When you think of breakfast, do you automatically think about a great cup of coffee as well? I do. And I think you do as well; otherwise, you wouldn’t have stumbled on this article.

This article will tell you all about the Café au Lait and how you can make this coffee at home. But that’s not all… down below, you’ll find all the information you need to make this amazing breakfast coffee within no time.

You are in the right place if you’ve always wanted to know about this coffee. Are you ready to learn all about it? Then grab yourself a nice cup of coffee and start reading away!

What is a Café au Lait?

A Café au Lait is a coffee drink made using equal parts of foamed up milk and coffee. Café au Lait is a French drink that is mostly used as a breakfast coffee.

By equal parts of coffee and milk, you can make this recipe with any amount you like. Would you like a smaller cup of coffee to start your day? You can use half the amount of coffee and milk mentioned in the recipe a bit further down.

The Café au Lait is such an easy coffee to brew. It takes almost no effort to make, which is one reason most people love to drink this coffee in the morning.

What ingredients are used in a Café au Lait?

There are just two ingredients used to make a Café au Lait: milk and freshly brewed coffee. You can swap out the milk for any milk alternative you like to use. Café au Lait is made by using equal parts of coffee and milk.

Note: I’ll be making this recipe by foaming up the milk. You can also serve this coffee by just heating the milk without foaming.

Additionally, you can add some sugar or other sweetener you like to use to make your coffee a bit sweeter. That’s all there is to this recipe. Let me go over the equipment you want to collect before starting with this recipe:

Equipment list to make a Café au Lait

Before getting started on the easy, but delicious recipe, you want to collect a bit of equipment to get started:

• Small saucepan to heat your milk, or milk foamer if you prefer it
• Coffee brewer (more on this later)
• Coffee grinder and coffee beans
• Your favorite cup
• Milk or milk alternative

If you feel like grinding your own coffee beans, you also want to grab some of your favorite coffee beans. As this recipe consists of milk and coffee, make sure that your coffee is of good quality to make it extra delicious.

I’ll get into the different coffee brewers you can use after the recipe. Are you ready to learn all about this recipe? Then read along:

What is the best coffee for a Café au Lait?

The best coffee to make a Café au Lait is a pot of freshly brewed coffee made with either a French press, Chemex, or even an AeroPress. These coffee brewers produce a high-quality, strong coffee that works best for this recipe.

My favorite coffee brewer to make my coffee with for this recipe is the French press. The French press brews such a full-bodied cup of coffee that it brings out the best flavors of the milk used in the recipe.

I’ve also tried to make this recipe using the Chemex and Hario V60. These pour over style coffee brewers make for a good option as well.

In the recipes that I’ve tried, I used a medium roasted coffee bean. Medium roasted coffee beans have the best slightly punchy coffee flavor that is perfect for this recipe.

Dark roasted coffee beans can be used as well, but be careful with too dark of a roast. The really dark roasted coffee beans tend to cut through everything, flavor-wise.

Make sure to balance your coffee and milk for this recipe as you want to taste them both when drinking your coffee.

Which milk is best used in this recipe?

Whole milk and 2% milk are best used to make a Café au Lait. However, if you want to use a milk alternative to make your coffee drink, feel free to do so. You can make a Café au Lait with whatever milk you like to use daily.

Cow’s milk, this being whole milk or milk with less fat, will work amazingly to brew this coffee. Cow’s milk foam up really well and hold their flavorful bubbles intact until you finish drinking your coffee.

But, feel free to use any milk alternative you want. Your Dream Coffee is about making the coffee you enjoy most.

I’ve noticed that milk alternatives don’t foam up that well. And if they do, they break apart pretty easily.

But not to worry, milk alternatives will work great for this recipe as you need to drink this coffee pretty fast either way to enjoy the smoothness of the milk and flavorful coffee combination.

How many calories are in a Café au Lait?

The number of calories in a Café au Lait can change depending on the milk you’re using. I used whole milk for this recipe, and it has 74 calories in it. If you’d like to know more about the calories in your coffee, you can check out the table below:

Milk or milk alternative used:	Amount of calories:
Whole milk	74 calories
2% fat milk	61 calories
Nonfat milk	43 calories
Oat milk	45 calories
Coconut milk	22 calories
Almond milk	20 calories
Soy milk	66 calories

As you can conclude from looking at the table above, the Café au Lait doesn’t contain a lot of calories. Of course, when using whole milk, you get more calories, but you have so many other options to choose from!

The great thing about milk alternatives is that they don’t have many calories to them. If you want to enjoy your morning coffee with the least amount of calories, I suggest using almond milk for this recipe.

Conclusion

Wow! This must be one of the easiest — yet most delicious coffee recipes to make in the mornings. The recipe is easy to follow, and you can make this coffee whenever you feel like adding some delicious foamy milk to your brewed coffee.

The table of calories in this recipe comes in handy when you’re on a diet or want to watch your caloric intake.

If you are interested in more coffee recipes, you can check them out by clicking below. I hope to see you back on my blog very soon as I have so many more cool recipes and guides to share with you.

Have you drunk a Café au Lait before? Let me know by leaving a comment down below. If you have any other questions regarding coffee, you can also contact me directly by pressing the “Contact Me” button at the top!

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