Iced Vanilla Latte: Make your own iced vanilla lattes for around $2 and stop overpaying for your favorite pricey coffee shop drinks!

Iced Vanilla Latte

By now you should know that coffee in all forms in an integral part of my day. It’s not that my body needs coffee, but that I love the taste of a really good, full-bodied coffee.

And especially in the winter months, I love to wrap my hands around a hot latte mug on a cold morning.

But in the summer months, when the humidity is so high, when the air is so thick it feels like it’s going to burst open with rain, all I crave is iced coffee, cold brew, and iced lattes.

My dad on the other hand, could never get enough hot coffee on these types of days. He never, ever turned down a cup of hot coffee even when the thermometer was reading 95°.

Iced Vanilla Latte

Truthfully, I’ve never been able to wrap my head around the habit of drinking hot drinks on hot days. The thought of it makes me hot just thinking about it!

In any event, I’m back today to share my very favorite iced latte recipe with you: the iced vanilla latte. And I’m so stinking excited about this!!

Iced Vanilla Latte

Since a Starbucks iced vanilla latte has been my go-to summer coffee drink for YEARS, I decided this year that I needed to start making it at home.

So, a few months back, I talked about how to make an iced latte at home. And man oh man! Readers are loving that post this summer!

Why Make Your Own Iced Lattes?

Learning how to make your own iced lattes will save you beaucoup bucks for sure. A grande (medium) iced vanilla latte from Starbucks costs over $5.00 these days.

Iced Vanilla Latte

With my Nespresso machine, it costs me around $2.00 to make an iced latte at home. And using a stove top espresso maker with freshly ground espresso beans would decrease the cost even more!

Before I dive into my vanilla iced latte recipe, let’s go through some basics about iced lattes in general.

Iced Vanilla Latte

What Is an Iced Latte?

An iced latte is simply milk mixed into espresso with ice in the glass. Yes! It’s that simple!

You can use any kind of dairy or non-dairy milk you want. Cow’s milk, almond milk, soy milk, pea milk, oat milk, and coconut milk are all great options!

Iced Vanilla Latte

How do You Flavor an Ice Latte?

Flavored iced lattes are where its at these days! I’ve been making my iced vanilla lattes and hot vanilla lattes with my homemade vanilla syrup. It’s a delicious syrup to have on hand in the fridge for all kinds of cold coffee drinks and even for cocktails.

If you’re not into making your own syrup, you can buy vanilla syrup. Amazon stocks it and I’m pretty sure I’ve seen it sold in Target stores too.

Iced Vanilla Latte

I’ve also made a slew of other syrups for cold drinks too. This brown sugar cinnamon syrup is a copycat recipe for the cinnamon dolce syrup from Starbucks. Do you like cinnamon dolce lattes? Then you need this syrup!

I’ve made 2 coconut syrups: toasted coconut and almond toasted coconut. Both are exceptionally good but the almond really ups the ante and that’s now my favorite of the two versions.

Iced Vanilla Latte

My blackberry vanilla syrup is SO SO good in cold coffee drinks! It’s the perfect summer syrup to make use of local blackberries and I’ve been using it in cocktails and other iced drinks this summer too.

Lastly to note, if you don’t like sweetener in your coffee, you can certainly make a latte without a flavored syrup. The drink will be strong but if that’s your thing, more power to you!

How do You Make an Iced Vanilla Latte?

First, gather up your ingredients for your iced vanilla latte: brewed espresso, milk, vanilla syrup, and ice.

Iced Vanilla Latte

Once you have everything ready, get going!

  1. Fill a glass with ice
  2. Add the syrup
  3. Pour the espresso over the ice or brew the espresso from your Nespresso or espresso machine directly over the ice
  4. Pour in the milk to fill the glass.

Like I said, it’s super easy to make this drink at home!

Iced Vanilla Latte

Pro Tip: Iced vanilla latte ingredient ratios (keeping in mind that the larger your glass is, the more ice you’ll need to fill it):

  • 12 oz iced latte (tall or small size drink from a coffee shop): 1 shot espresso, 1 ounce vanilla syrup, 8 ounces milk
  • 16 oz iced latte (grande or medium size drink from a coffee shop): 2 shots espresso, 2 ounces vanilla syrup, 8 ounces milk
  • 20 oz iced latte (venti or large size drink from a coffee shop): 3 shots espresso, 4 ounces vanilla syrup, 8 ounces milk

Iced Vanilla Latte

Now that you’re armed with the best information about how to make an iced vanilla latte at home, I really hope you try to make your own!

My iced vanilla lattes are a big part of my morning routine as I settle down in front of my computer after daycare drop off and I’d love to hear how you make it part of yours this summer!

Iced Vanilla Latte

Iced Vanilla Latte

Yield: 1 16 oz drink
Prep Time: 1 minute
Cook Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 6 minutes

Your favorite (and pricey) iced vanilla latte drink can easily be made at home for around $2! Forget about overpaying at the coffee shop and make your own iced vanilla latte using my very-well tested Starbucks copycat recipe.

Ingredients

  • 2 oz vanilla syrup
  • 2 shots of brewed hot or cold espresso (approximately 2 oz)
  • 8 oz milk (any variety)

Instructions

  1. Add vanilla syrup to a 16 oz glass filled with ice.
  2. Pour the espresso over the ice (see note below).
  3. Pour milk into the glass and stir until the milk, syrup, and espresso are combined.

Notes

You can either brew the espresso directly over the ice if you have an espresso machine or make the espresso on the stove top and pour it over the ice. The espresso can be hot or cold when you pour it over the ice.

How much do you love this recipe?

Follow Smells Like Home on Pinterest and click that little Pin button at the top of this recipe card to save this recipe and share with your Pinterest followers!

You Might Also Like:

Leave a Comment

  • Barbara Meyers
    August 14, 2019 at 7:30 PM

    I did not see a recipe on how to make vanilla syrup. Your site may be good but I like facts not stories. It’s too much to read. You just say add the vanilla syrup. How much.?

    • Tara
      August 15, 2019 at 8:28 AM

      Hi Barbara, Thank you for your feedback. Here is the link to my vanilla syrup recipe (http://www.smells-like-home.com/2019/06/homemade-vanilla-syrup/), which is also linked in the recipe card as the first item on the list. My whole site and over 12 years of recipe posts (almost 900 recipes), is built around the stories I write about the food I make. I’m sorry this doesn’t appeal to you but you can always just scroll right down the the recipe if this works better for you. Thank you for visiting anyway.

  • Hot chocolatey milk
    July 13, 2020 at 5:02 PM

    This was very good! I’ve been struggling to make coffee taste as good as what I get from restaurants and this is it! So very much needed as my caffeine-addicted self has been up for twelve hours, already finished my work day and still haven’t gotten my fix. Thank you!

    • Tara
      July 15, 2020 at 9:17 AM

      I love hearing this and I’m so glad another caffeine-addicted human has found this latte method to work so well. I’m drinking one as I type this right now so I really get what you’re saying! Thank you so much for taking the time to come back to leave a review!