Bulletproof Coffee - Mocha Style

Butter in my coffee?  I've been experimenting with so called 'Bullet Proof Coffee' which is coffee plus butter (grass fed or pastured) plus coconut or MCT oil mixed up in a blender.  You can read more about it here.  Some of the alleged benefits include improved mental function, help with fat burning (if you're following a low carb/high fat diet) and appetite suppression which is helpful for intermittent fasting.  My interest in it is a possible pre-race concoction to boost race day performance though the creator of the stuff doesn't necessarily promote it for that.

In addition, the creator sells his own 'upgraded coffee' which supposedly doesn't make you as jittery and icky feeling as regular coffee can and also supposedly doesn't make you have to pee as much or as urgently because allegedly it has less mycotoxins than regular coffee, even the fancy pants stuff.  He also sells his own 'upgraded brain octane oil' that is supposedly 18x stronger than coconut oil and purports to reduce brain fog, increase brain power and give you fast energy.  Now believe me, I know all about marketing.  More than I wish I knew.  I was plenty cynical about the claims.  But I was interested to give his stuff a try nonetheless.  I had no MCT oil and Jonny was out of coffee so may as well.

It did not go well at first to put it mildly.  Apparently at first I made the coffee too strong for what I can tolerate caffeine-wise and I felt very very bad for about 3 hours.  Heart racing, jittery, unable to think or do much of anything, pretty much the opposite of what I was hoping for.  But I put this down to user error.  I don't tolerate caffeine very well and I had no idea that the recommended amount would be too much for me.  So I kept cutting back the amount of beans I used and I started adding my own stuff to it.  First some almond/coconut milk with a dash a half and half and then some unsweetened cocoa until finally I had the almost perfect concoction - Bulletproof Mocha.  I say almost perfect because between the weak coffee and all the added stuff I now hardly feel any positive effect from the coffee.  So I may try to make it just a wee bit stronger and see what happens.  In any case, my new concoction is amazingly delicious and a solution to my love of mochas but intolerance of sugar.

The only downside is, wow, this is ridiculously complicated for first thing in the morning before I've had my caffeine.  This is all the stuff you need, not including a teapot and one or two pots.

I need some bulletproof mocha before I can make my bulletproof mocha.

Here is my recipe.

2 non-heaping tablespoons of upgraded coffee, ground very fine (this is weak, 2 1/2 heaping tablespoons are recommended but that was WAY too strong for me)

1-2 tablespoons grass fed or pastured butter or ghee

3/4 tablespoon upgraded MCT oil (working my way up to 2 tablespoons)

8 ounces boiled water for coffee

6 ounces or so almond/coconut milk blend plus splash of half and half or heavy cream

1 1/2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa

Before I start gathering and preparing everything I put a teapot of water on to boil and when it's done I put it in the blender to heat up the blender and keep it warm.

I heat up the almond/coconut milk and gradually add the cocoa.  Make sure a skin doesn't form because ewww, gross.  Of course you can use milk or cream or whatever you like or skip it altogether and just put the cocoa in the blender with the coffee.

Once you've got the coffee made however you like to make it (I use a pour over filter thingy because I don't know how to work the coffee maker and sheesh, already too much with the equipment and gizmos) and the milk/cocoa heated you simply pour the heated water out of the blender and add coffee, milk/cocoa mixture, butter and MCT oil then blend for about 30 secs.

Kind of a big hassle but mmmmmmm, so worth it.

And of course you can add sugar to taste and make whip cream if you want a real mocha.  I would have loved to have had whip cream this morning but sheesh that's another project and my stand mixer is so heavy to drag out and lift from the ground floor cabinet.  And really it was super tasty enough as it was.

Even better on a snowy April Sunday morning with one of my bestest buds for company (Jonny missed all the fun because at 6:30 in the morning he walked up to the local coffee shop in a snowstorm to watch a soccer game.  Because he might be a little bit touched in the head).

No I did not share it with him.  The last thing that dog needs is caffeine on a snowy day when he's cooped up inside.

I'll get off of food and back on to dogs and triathlon soon, just bogged down with important life type stuff.  But I've got 2 trials coming up in the next few weeks, one of them being Regionals and I've started working with a triathlon coach for the first time ever in my life and I'll write a bit about that too.