A taste of Starbucks’ autumn collection

What do you picture when you think of autumn? One thing that people often say when asked this question is “pumpkin” followed by some food or drink. Some pumpkin foods and drinks that remind us of the fall season are pumpkin pies, pumpkin cookies, and pumpkin-flavored ice cream. Another notable one that people always bring up is the famous Pumpkin Spice Latte from Starbucks. To see if Starbucks’ fall repertoire lives up to the hype around it, two of our members tried five of their fall items, one being the iconic PSL.

The drink is a very bright orange color, and it had powder on top, which we found to be pumpkin spice. The first sips of this drink were not great. With the pumpkin spice on top with the additional cream, the pumpkin completely overpowered the peaceful Chai flavors. We mixed it after those first couple of sips, and the drink ended up being everything we expected it to be. It was the perfect blend of a sweet, classic iced chai with the perfect hint of pumpkin spice.

The muffin is moist, fluffy, tender, and big, with a dollop of cream cheese in the middle. Paired with the cream cheese, the muffin has a perfect balance between sweet and savory. However, the muffin lacked a lot of pumpkin flavor. It was still evidently a pumpkin muffin, but the taste was mellow and not popping out like most pumpkin foods and drinks try to do. Slight hints of nutmeg and cinnamon were in the muffin, but they didn’t stand out either. If you’re craving pumpkin, or a stand-out flavor of any kind for that matter, this isn’t the muffin for you.

The croissant is thick, doughy, and not that flaky. It was the opposite of what we expect a croissant to be: light and buttery. This, however, pairs wonderfully with the sweet and flavorful apple filling inside it. The dessert is relatively small, making it great for a quick bite.

This drink has a darker reddish color with some cinnamon mixed in with it, giving it a brown tint. Although the drink had the main flavor as “Apple Crisp,” the taste of sweet apple that we expected to see was nowhere to be found here. The blonde espresso in the macchiato was overpowering, and the extra cinnamon only added to the bitterness. If this drink was called “Iced Cinnamon Oat Milk Macchiato,” this would be okay, but we were looking for more of an apple flavor.

With its deep orange color and the rich pumpkin scent, the drink attracts many people. Hints of nutmeg and cinnamon support the cozy pumpkin drink, and the taste of the pumpkin spice mixes perfectly with the other flavors. The punch of pumpkin spice makes the few sips overwhelming, but every other sip has a perfect pumpkin flavor.

Even though the Pumpkin Spice Latte is Starbucks’ most well-known, it isn’t their best fall item. This is our final ranking on these fall drinks and snacks:

1st –  Pumpkin Spice Cream Chai

2nd – Pumpkin Spice Latte

3rd – Baked Apple Croissant

4th – Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffin

5th – Iced Apple Crisp Oat Milk Macchiato

Let us know your favorite fall drink!

+7