Buzz
For years, I was someone who couldn't drink coffee without milk and a bit of 'Sugar in the Raw.' Just one packet—ideally half a packet—was the absolute minimum I needed to make it bearable. Before that, I used to alternate between Sweet 'n Low and Splenda, two artificial sweeteners I never fully embraced, both because of how easily you could overdo the sweetness and the potential health risks they carried. Mostly, I just didn’t like how they tasted.
Growing up in a house where Cheerios and air-popped popcorn were the staples, with never a bowl of Cap’n Crunch or Twinkies in sight, I was never fully convinced by Sugar in the Raw either, despite its claims of being unbleached and tropical with its humble brown-paper-bag packaging. Once I found out it’s no healthier than white sugar, I decided to ditch it, especially as new natural sugar substitutes gained popularity.
Then came Stevia: a plant-based sweetener from the Chrysanthemum family, native to Paraguay and Brazil. I was all in! But after using it in my coffee for almost ten years, the aftertaste started to get to me. Plus, I began experiencing frequent headaches. Once I realized these headaches were happening several times a week, I decided to cut out Stevia and, sure enough, they subsided.
What’s a coffee lover to do when they enjoy a good cup, but aren’t into drinking it black (and can’t stand sweeteners)?
Try using cream to balance out the bitterness
When my brother-in-law first suggested that the fats in half-and-half and cream could offset the bitterness of black coffee, I was doubtful. Could milk, amped up, really do what sugar used to? Just to clarify, he wasn’t talking about coffee creamer—those processed, flavored powders and liquids that often contain up to 5g of sugar per serving. He was referring to plain, unprocessed heavy cream or half-and-half, which is just a 50-50 mix of milk and cream.
Turns out, he was right. A few years into using this method, I’m fully converted and never going back. Not only does half-and-half smooth out the bitter, acidic edge of black coffee, it adds a creamy, almost buttery richness—and a bit of nutritional value too.
Isn’t heavy cream (and half-and-half) bad for you?
For years, many diet trends have painted fat as the villain, but fats actually play crucial roles in the body, like forming cell membranes and helping with blood clotting. Healthy fats can even improve your body’s ability to burn fat and keep you feeling full longer. Of course, consuming too much fat can be harmful, but adding a tablespoon or two of cream to your coffee isn’t going to push you into bad health. Plus, if you choose full-fat cream, there’s no need to worry about the effects of lactose, since cream has almost no sugar, unlike milk which contains lactose.
The takeaway
Not only do I no longer miss sugar, it now feels completely out of place in my coffee's smooth, rich flavor. (I had to reluctantly use fat-free milk and sugar while visiting my dad, and I ended up pouring it out.) If you’re tired of sugar and its substitutes, consider adding more cream to your coffee for a thicker, fuller texture. This article suggests you could also try salt and cinnamon, but that’s an experiment you’ll need to do on your own—and let me know how it goes.
