12 Flavors That Clash With Coffee

There are so many great flavors you can add to your coffee, whether you want to boost the flavor of your beans with spices like cinnamon or nutmeg or even complement an herbal coffee with some fresh herbs. Aside from all the syrups and spices we know and love, however, there are a lot of common flavors you really don’t want to add to your coffee — even if they seem like a good idea.

As a former barista, I’ve had the misfortune of trying many of these flavor combinations so you don’t have to. At the end of the day, taste is subjective — so it’s true that there are some die-hard fans of at least one or two coffee combinations on this list. These are the flavors that I would generally steer clear of recommending because a majority of people will dislike them. If you’re looking for a new coffee blend you’ll truly love, trying to concoct a latte flavor you’ve never tried before, or are just messing around in your spice cabinet, then keep in mind these common flavors that have no business being in your cup of coffee.

At first glance, mint might seem like a perfectly reasonable flavor to pair with coffee. After all, is it really the holiday season without a classic peppermint latte? When you think of mint and coffee, chances are you’re thinking about some sort of peppermint (and maybe chocolate) concoction with milk, sweetener, and possibly even whipped cream. While it’s true that many coffee drinks can be delicious with a hint of mint, coffee itself usually doesn’t taste very good with the herb.

Maybe a minty mocha sounds divine, but have you ever tried to drink a black coffee after brushing your teeth? When you’re trying to pair mint with coffee, you really need to work carefully. Mint can significantly alter the taste of your coffee blend. Citrusy and floral coffee flavors can be completely overwhelmed by the strength of mint, and the herb’s cooling sensation can also contrast negatively with some brews. I’m not going to try and stop you from mixing a peppermint candy into your coffee, but adding fresh mint or mint oil? You might want to pass.

If you’re desperate to add a little bit of mint to your coffee, you should only do so when you’re drinking iced coffee — so that the cooling sensation doesn’t offset the natural flavors of your brew quite as much. Just be aware that you probably won’t be able to taste all the usual notes of your coffee, and adding mint will significantly change its flavor.

Lemon has its place in certain coffee drinks. For example, iced coffee and lemonade is a combination many people swear by (especially when you’re using high-quality lemonade or fresh lemons). But not everyone claims to be convinced by coffee and lemon, and there’s a reason for that.

The natural tartness and acidity in lemon juice typically doesn’t pair well with most coffees. Not only will the tart flavor overpower your taste buds and prevent your tongue from understanding all the tasting notes in your coffee blend, but you’re also likely to find that the lemon ends up making the delicate acidity of your coffee blend way too strong. Even just a hint of lemon juice can do a huge disservice to the acidity in your coffee. It’s true that you probably want your coffee to be at least slightly acidic, but that acidity should come naturally from your coffee beans — it doesn’t need to be added after the fact.

Another not-so-fun fact about lemon and coffee is that pouring lemon juice into your latte can cause your milk to curdle, giving you an extra unpleasant texture along with the pucker-worthy taste.

Let’s talk about oranges and coffee. Before you start waving your pitchfork around, note that I’m primarily talking about orange juice. Some coffee beans, blends, and drinks will use orange flavorings, oils, or citrus zest. You’re likely to find plenty of bagged coffee brands that claim to have notes of orange, and many of them will pull off these flavor profiles successfully.

So, why is orange on this list? If you’ve ever tried to drink orange juice and coffee right after one another, you already know why. Again, it’s the acidity that’s the problem. When you add orange juice to your coffee, it creates a super acidic flavor profile that removes your ability to taste all the subtle and delicate notes from the coffee beans of your choosing. It makes the acidic notes in your coffee taste harsh and bitter, and completely changes the flavor profile of your coffee — from light to sour and from sweet to overwhelming.

If you want some orange flavor in your coffee, just opt for coffee beans that having citrusy tasting notes. You can also go for brands that use orange zest in their bean blends, or just add a bit of orange peel to your coffee grinds before you brew them. This is a great way to lightly flavor your coffee without overpowering it — just remember, a little goes a long way.

Grapefruit is probably one of the most disliked citruses when it comes to coffee. While many brands will employ oranges in some form in their coffee blends, grapefruit is hardly ever used in the coffee world. It’s too bitter to pair with coffee — it gives the coffee an extremely sharp, overwhelming flavor that turns even the finest coffee blends sour. You already know that acidity is the main problem component here; but you can probably also imagine that the taste of grapefruit in general, which is extremely tart and tangy, really doesn’t pair well with any kind of coffee.

Generally, I wouldn’t even recommend adding grapefruit peels to your coffee, though you can certainly try if you’re a huge grapefruit fan. If you’re looking for a gentle tang of citrus, something sweeter will usually pair better. Adding an orange peel to your French press? Sure, go for it. But a grapefruit peel will likely taste too harsh. That’s because they sometimes have more pith (the white part inside the peel) than other types of citrus, which also makes them extremely bitter.

Apple isn’t an uncommon tasting note in the coffee world. That’s because some coffee beans bear notes of fruit — some of which can include fruits like apples or cherries. Generally, though, this apple flavor isn’t as strong as that of an actual apple. Apple tasting notes tend to encompass a flavor that’s more floral and sweet rather than tasting exactly like a real apple, which is too tangy and acidic to pair well with most coffees.

If you mix pure apple fruit (or juice) and coffee together, you’ll probably find that both of them taste much more bitter than they do when enjoyed separately. When you see apple used in the coffee world — such as with Starbucks’ fall line of apple-flavored drinks — you’re likely to notice that these types of beverages uses apple syrup or apple flavoring, which is much sweeter than a regular apple. This keeps apple’s acidity out of your coffee. Even then, some people still find the über-sweet apple syrup a little disconcerting to the palette.

If you remember the Starbucks Juniper Latte debacle of 2018, you can probably already guess that juniper and coffee are a match made in, um, not heaven. While woodsy flavors are inherently popular in the coffee world — and for good reason — juniper doesn’t fit the bill. Flavors like oak, smoked wood, and earthy tasting notes can all be truly delicious in coffee. They provide a rich, deep flavor that beautifully complements a dark roast. Juniper, on the other hand, has too many notes of pine in it to work well with coffee.

The trouble with juniper is that it literally makes your coffee taste like a tree. You’re probably catching on to a theme here; any flavor that is so strong it completely overpowers your coffee is a bad one. Juniper is too strong and sharp for any kind of coffee — it will override all of the tasting notes of your drink, negating the point of brewing coffee in the first place. If you love the taste of air freshener or chemical cleaners, juniper and coffee is for you. But no matter whether you opt for oils or syrups, juniper is bad form in a cup. After all, there is a reason why it never returned to Starbucks’ holiday menu.

Believe it or not, banana coffee has been tried before — well, sort of. Starbucks released the Tie Dye Frappe in the summer of 2020, and it failed for more reason than one — but part of its limited success was due to the fact that customers who dared to add a coffee base to the mix were left wanting to return the drink almost immediately. While both bananas and coffee are useful as on-the-go breakfast items, you can’t deny that when eaten together they’re a recipe for disaster.

Banana’s flavor can be extremely overpowering when mixed with just one other ingredient. Its sweetness has a distinct flavor to it. Even if you’re drinking a fruity coffee, you’re likely to find that banana’s flavor profile doesn’t mix well with any kind of fruity notes — whether of berries or citrus. Acidity can still be a minor problem in this case, too — especially if you’re enjoying a slightly unripe banana — but it’s mostly banana’s flavor that presents a compelling reason for keeping it far away from your cup of coffee.

There are a few people out there who will undoubtedly disagree when I say that ginger and coffee don’t pair well. It’s true that ginger is a star in many drinks — such as when added to steamed milk or used in tea — and it’s a great way to make a warm winter drink taste even more warming. But it doesn’t usually taste very good when paired with coffee, at least for most people.

It’s a cardinal rule of the coffee world to keep spice away from your coffee blend. It’s true that some coffees will have notes of certain spices — like cinnamon, for example — but they themselves won’t be spicy. Baking spices like cinnamon and nutmeg carry a certain depth of flavor to them, but they won’t make your throat burn or your mouth feel like it’s on fire.

Ginger, however, has a spicy kick to it. This spice can prevent you from detecting the more delicate flavors in your coffee. If you add ginger to your coffee, you’ll really only be able to taste the spice — you’ll miss out on all the other tasting notes that would normally be present in your brew. Another important component of drinking coffee is detecting the aftertastes that linger after your sip of coffee. Often, these flavor notes will be separate from those you taste when you first drink the brew. When your tongue is overwhelmed by spice, it likely won’t be able to detect those aftertastes.

If you’re craving ginger, save it for its own drink where it can be the star of the show. There’s no reason to add it to coffee when you won’t even be able to taste the coffee blend you used.

Some people really, really love the taste of stevia, while others can’t stand it. It’s a polarizing alternative sweetener. Some people find that it tastes highly medicinal, especially when used in large quantities. This is the main reason why it just doesn’t work in coffee. If you love the taste of stevia, you might disagree, but you can’t deny that stevia completely changes the way that coffee tastes.

For one, its sweetness is so strong that it can overpower the other flavors in your coffee. A coffee with subtle or delicate sweetness — or even one that’s intentionally smoky or slightly bitter — can have its aroma and flavor ruined by stevia. The medicinal taste of the sweetener can also change the way you perceive the taste of your coffee blend. You might find that stevia overpowers certain flavors — like light florals or acidic citruses — or that it just clashes with the taste of your favorite coffee. To some, stevia might even make coffee taste bitter.

Regardless of whether you love or hate stevia, it’s undeniable that it changes the flavor of your coffee in a way that sugar often does not. Therefore, use it sparingly — if you feel the need to use it at all, that is.

We all know and (hopefully) hate the recent rise in olive oil coffee. While some olive oil and coffee fanatics (especially those who had the chance to try Starbucks’ infamous Oleato coffee) claim the pairing originates in Italy, this actually isn’t true. Some Italians do follow the practice of taking a spoonful of olive oil in the morning for gut health — which also happens to be around the same time most people drink their coffee — but nobody is going about mixing the two.

You should definitely think twice about adding olive oil to your coffee. Besides the obvious texture contrast — namely, olive oil separates in coffee, causing it to float to the top and clog up each sip of your drink — the taste of olive oil and coffee is truly an unforgettable one, and not in a good way. Olive oil is far too vegetal and grassy to make a positive impact on your coffee. Some olive oils might also taste bitter in a way that clashes with the flavor of coffee. Because olive oil and coffee separate, you’re unlikely to be able to actually mix the flavors together in the way you might imagine; essentially, you’ll be drinking pure olive oil and then sipping on coffee afterward, which almost feels worse than actually mixing them together. 

Blueberry is a slightly more controversial item on this list because there are some blueberry lovers who will valiantly defend their right to a coffee with blueberry syrup. For most people, however, the combination isn’t a desirable one. Coffee blends and beans will have flavors from many different berries — like raspberries, cherries, or even sweet jam — but blueberries contain a more tart, unique flavor that generally pairs poorly with the acidity of coffee. You might find that blueberry makes your coffee taste sour, or just that the taste of blueberries (tartly floral) doesn’t work well with your brew of choice.

Blueberry syrup is often found to be very sickly sweet by many. Even in syrup form, blueberry flavoring doesn’t usually mix well with bitter, smoky, or acidic coffee. It’s possible that blueberries fall on the “okay” side of the coffee pairings scale when presented as a jam or compote, since sweet (but not too sweet) jammy flavors are enjoyed by those who prefer lighter, more palatable coffees. Generally, plain blueberries aren’t the way to go.

There are a lot of wonderful herbs you can mix into your coffee. Lavender lattes are a lovely floral drink, and adding herbs to your iced latte will give your coffee a pop of flavor. Rosemary, basil, and even thyme are all herbs that many enjoy in their morning brew; they add subtle, fresh flavor without overwhelming the notes of an earthy coffee. If you want your coffee to taste like black licorice, you can try adding fennel. Some herbs can change the flavor of your coffee, but not always in a bad way — experimenting with fresh herbs to add depth, new flavors, or complementary flavors can be a fun way to put a twist on your daily coffee.

However, sharper, grassier, and extremely vegetal herbs are generally a bad idea to pair with coffee. Parsley is a fantastic example of this because it tastes so sharp and bitter that it’s almost impossible to pair with coffee. While its herbaceous and bright color makes parsley seem like it’s the perfect herb for dressing up a plain cup of coffee, you’re likely to find that parsley’s flavors clash in a way that’s distasteful (literally). Floral, citrusy, and herbal coffees tend to go better with herbs that are able to complement or add to all of their individual tasting notes — not ones that completely override them.