Pistachio Cream Cold Brew
Do you love the Pistachio Cream Cold Brew from Starbucks? This make-at-home copycat version tastes just like the real thing and is easy to make! The step-by-step recipe instructs you on how to make each component, but also offers lots of simple shortcuts, too.
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Makes: 1 grande drink
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Ingredients
- 10 oz. cold brew (store-bought or homemade)
- 1 oz. vanilla syrup (store-bought or recipe below)
- ⅓ cup pistachio cream cold foam (recipe below)
- Salted brown butter cookie topping (recipe below or substitute with brown butter syrup or crushed shortbread cookies)
Pistachio Cream Cold Foam
- ½ cup 2% milk
- ½ cup heavy cream
- 2 tablespoon pistachio sauce (recipe below or substitute with pistachio syrup)
- 2 teaspoon vanilla syrup store-bought or homemade- see notes for more options
Pistachio Sauce
- ¼ cup pistachio butter (unsweetened is best) see notes if making your own
- ½ cup sweetened condensed milk
- ½ cup 2% milk
- ¼ cup granulated sugar
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- ⅛ teaspoon salt
Salted Brown Butter Cookie Topping
- 1 tablespoon butter
- Pinch salt (if using unsalted butter)
- ½ tablespoon brown sugar
Vanilla Syrup
- 1 cup water
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 1 vanilla bean
Instructions
- Pour cold brew into an ice-filled glass. Stir in vanilla syrup.
- Add pistachio cream cold foam. Top with salted brown butter cookie topping and enjoy!
Pistachio Cream Cold Foam
- Mix milk, cream, and pistachio sauce (or pistachio syrup) in a mason jar and shake to combine. Alternatively, you can stir all ingredients together in a bowl. This is the "pistachio sweet cream." If you're not using right away, keep in an airtight container in the fridge.
- Turn mixture into cold foam right before using. You can either use an electric frother, hand mixer, or blender. Just add about ⅓ cup of the sweet cream and froth, mix, or blend until the mixture turns into a foam. Alternatively, you can shake the mixture in a mason jar until it's frothy.
Pistachio Sauce
- Put all ingredients in blender and process for about 45 seconds until completely smooth.
- Pour sauce into a jar or other airtight container and keep in fridge until ready to use. Sauce should keep fresh in fridge for about 2 weeks.
Salted Brown Butter Cookie Topping
- Put butter in a light-colored pan over medium heat (it should be light color so it's easy to see when it's browning). Constantly stir butter as it melts. Once melted, it should start to bubble and in just a minute or two, you'll start seeing brown flecks on the bottom of the saucepan and the butter will start smelling nutty.
- Remove from heat and continue to stir for another 30 seconds. Pour into a small heat-proof bowl. If you used unsalted butter, stir in a pinch salt here.
- Immediately stir in brown sugar until well combined. If making ahead of time, store in an airtight container in your fridge. When you're ready to use, warm it in the microwave and stir until it's liquid again. You can also warm over very low heat on the stovetop.
Homemade Vanilla Syrup
- Put water and sugar in a medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Lower heat and let mixture simmer for about 10 minutes until sugar is completely dissolved and mixture has thickened a bit.
- Pour syrup into a heat-proof jar or container. Scrape out some of the seeds from the sliced open vanilla pod with a sharp knife and add them and the vanilla bean into the syrup.
- Place syrup in fridge and let steep for at least 6 hours**. Syrup will thicken more as it cools. If you want a more intense vanilla flavor, you can leave the bean in after 6 hours.
- For a quicker vanilla syrup, you can use vanilla extract instead of a vanilla bean. Stir about a Tablespoon of the extract into the saucepan right when you remove it from the heat. Syrup will be ready to use as soon as it cools.
Notes
-
If making your own pistachio butter, put shelled pistachios in a blender or food processor and process until smooth. You can also put them in a mortar and use a pestle to crush them and turn them into a paste. You want the pistachio butter to be fairly smooth, but you can leave some chunks if you want.
- The cold foam has vanilla syrup in it, which you can purchase or make yourself. If you don't want to make or buy it, simply add 1-2 teaspoon of granulated sugar into the cold foam mixture and a little vanilla extract if you have it. Alternatively, you can add 1-2 teaspoon of sweetened condensed milk.
- I also like to top the drink with some crushed pistachios, though they don't do this at Starbucks.
- You should be able to make about 3 drinks with cold foam recipe, 10 drinks with vanilla syrup, and and 4 batches of cold foam with the pistachio sauce) .
- You can either use all the brown butter cookie topping for one drink or split it between 2 (in my photos, I split one batch between 2 drinks). If you prefer, you can simply use these brown butter sprinkles.
- Pistachio sweet cream should keep in your fridge in an airtight container for about a week. I recommend turning it into cold foam right before using.
- I updated my pistachio sauce recipe on 1/10/26 to be more in line with Starbucks' recipe and to be easier for you to make. The previous recipe was thicker and required heating on the stove-top. This one blends into cold drinks much better.
Share a Photo of Your Finished Recipe!Mention @wearenotmartha and share a photo if you've made the recipe!