Pumpkin Spice Latte at Home

My attempt at an at-home Pumpkin Spice Latte! 

It's feeling like fall, and you know what that means! Pumpkin is back! I love all things pumpkin. I currently have some pumpkin soap, pumpkin cupcake scented candles, I just made some pumpkin bread, I had a pumpkin smoothie, and I even had some pumpkin cider. Last fall I fell in love with pumpkin, and this fall is only going to be more hardcore pumpkin action going on, especially in my kitchen.

One of my favorite things about fall is the comeback of the pumpkin spice latte at Starbucks. I will admit, I just bought a living social coupon for Sbux, but I was feeling too lazy to go out. Today I ventured to make a pumpkin spice latte at home. I made one last fall that was literally to die for, but I was unable to find the same recipe. If you look on Pinterest or just Google pumpkin spice latte, a ton of results come up. I didn't really know where to start, but I thought this one sounded good. I altered the original recipe. My recipe is below.

Pumpkin Spice Latte

1 1/4 cup milk (I use vanilla almond milk)
1 1/2 tbsp pumpkin puree (I use canned)
1 tbsp. vanilla extract
1/2 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
2 shots of strong coffee (I used Dunkin Donuts Pumpkin Spice coffee!)

1. Mix all the ingredients but the coffee together in a sauce pan. Bring to hot but not boiling, mixing often.
2. Brew coffee stronger than normal to create an espresso shot (of if you have an espresso machine, use it).
3. Put pumpkin milk mixture into blender (This idea is from the original recipe: worked amazingly!). Froth the milk mixture well.
4. Put the coffee shots in a large cup and pour the milk mixture over it.
5. Enjoy!

As you can see if you looked at the original recipe, my recipe uses all the same ingredients, just different measurements. The original says it makes "1-2 servings." This was confusing to me. Does it make one or two?! I was worried I would make too much if I followed the original measurements, so that's why I altered them. What I came up with was a mug full to the top of latte. Just one serving, just the way I like it.

I'm also not nuts about vanilla in things, so I chose to use less than the original recipe. Overall, it was really good - better than I was expecting, but it still wasn't the one I found last fall! I'll have to keep searching for that recipe. I put some pumpkin pie spice on the top for a nice "latte look" but I would strongly recommend not doing that. It made my latte gritty and I felt like the spices were getting stuck in my throat, whereas it was not like that at all before I put the spices on top.

Frothing the milk mixture in the blender is such a good idea! I had foamy goodness on the top just like you get at Starbucks. I will definitely be using that technique with future lattes. I'll probably try a few more pumpkin spice latte recipes before I decide on the perfect one, but for now, this one will do for my afternoon read :)