Instead, add butter and oil for on-trend bulletproof coffee. —Stefanie Gans
Ever since I read about Shailene Woodley’s adoration for bulletproof coffee in Food & Wine, I started investigating this concoction of coffee, butter and coconut oil. A few of my food writer friends heard of it, but none were converts. It wasn’t until a dedicated member of the CrossFit and Paleo community sent me a link to The Bulletproof Executive for instructions that I understood how to create this morning cocktail.
Once all three ingredients buzz together in the blender, the coffee turns frothy—more mocha than Sanka—and smells beachy from the coconut oil. After a few sips my lips feel slick from the butter—and my stomach starts churning. The fats soon separate and it looks like an oil spill in my coffee. Maybe too much fat in the morning? But that’s part of bulletproof’s conceit: get the fat in the morning so your body doesn’t crave (and you indulge) it later.
I never tried it again until I spied bulletproof coffee at Bon Vivant Cafe + Farm Market (formerly Seva), in Del Ray.
Owner Jawad Laouaouda says his version is silky. And I agree. He found the right proportions and how to keep the coffee from breaking, like a chef and his Bearnaise. The Morocco native brews 12 cups of local coffee from Swing’s, blends half of it with ground cinnamon and three tablespoons each of Pennsylvania’s Trickling Springs Creamery unsalted, grass-fed butter and Ojio raw organic coconut oil. After 10 seconds on high speed, Laouaouda mixes the fatty and non-fatty coffees. At order, it’s pumped from a carafe.
In the mug ($2.90), a sheen of fat glistens on the surface. There’s a hint of butter, but it’s smooth, and actually quite delicious—even after more than 30 minutes, the fat and liquid cohere.
It’s not all about the taste or squelching the desire for fat. Laouaouda, who drinks a bulletproof coffee every other day, says when lipids coat the stomach, “your body doesn’t absorb the caffeine as fast.” In other words: “It gives you a longer buzz.” / 2016 Mount Vernon Ave., Alexandria
(September 2014)
