Though Vulcan Mocha isn’t mentioned in Star Trek: Original Series (or maybe it was and I just don’t remember), it’s a very popular drink in later series, and it’s considered to have been part of Vulcan cultural cuisine for centuries. The preferred drink of many Vulcans and non-Vulcans alike, Vulcan Mocha is said to be incredibly potent in its effects, yet sweeter than Earth coffee. I was intrigued by the idea, so I decided to make a tea for it!
I’ve made several coffee-inspired tea blends in the past (like Elementary: A Sherlock Tea and Chocolate Mocha Tea for Ze Little Grey Cells from Hercule Poirot), so I relished the challenge of making something new. Like most of my “coffee teas,” I started with Adagio Tea’s Mocha Nut Mate, a toasted mate blend with distinct yet subtle nutty flavor. It’s a great foundation for building blends, since it marries well with other flavors. For this blend, I wanted something subtle, faintly sweet, and complex—the perfect go-to beverage for the universe’s most logical alien race.
I added chestnut tea to the mate for a lighter, less dominant flavor. Then I put in just a hint of Tiger’s Eye, a unique Adagio blend with flavors of chocolate and caramel. I LOVED the result. Enjoy! 🙂
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Vulcan Mocha
This tea is subtle and nutty with a distinct mocha flavor, though lighter than true coffee. The flavors are lightened and barely sweetened by the chocolate and caramel. The Mocha Nut Mate base provides a high level of caffeine, just like the Vulcan Mocha in the show.
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This is a neat idea! I don’t even remember this being mentioned I haven’t seen the series in so long haha. XD
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I don’t think it’s officially mentioned until Voyager, but the implication is that it’s something that’s been around for a really long time. So I figured it would be okay to use it for the TOS menu. 🙂
Ah, it was the drink Ensign Kim ordered in an episode of Star Trek: Voyager.
Episode 2 of season 5. “Non Sequitur”
Ensign Kim was on board a shuttlecraft and suddenly finds himself transported to earth, and he finds out that the lives of the crew of Voyager were redically altered. His life was that he was denied a posting on Voyager and took an assignment working at the shuttlecraft development at Starfleet HQ.
I remembered the episode very well for some reason. My favorite moment was as Kim leaves home for work he goes past a coffee house, and the owner knows exactly what kind of drink he wants: The Vulcan Mocha!
The only thing is the idea of the drink perplexed me. I used to work in a coffee house myself, so I knew how all the drinks worked and were made. An espresso is just one ounce of coffee, specially brewed, sort of concentrated coffee you could say. One ounce of espresso has as much caffeine as an 8 ounce cup of regular coffee, as much as I can remember. So ordering a “Double Espresso” meant you wanted to have two cups of coffee, but you wanted to drink it in a hurry because you were late for work. Who knows? 😉
A latte was composed one just one espresso shot and steamed milk (for a small size. Medium size drinks called for two shots, and large had three shots of espresso. Although you can also ask for an extra shot to be added, so imagine if you got a large latte with an extra shot? That’s like 4 shots of espresso!
Now a Mocha was just like a latte with one exception: Chocolate syrup is added to the drink. So in a sense, the way I saw it, was that a mocha is really a hot chocolate with espresso shots thrown in. Whipped cream is an optional thing to top it off with. Another way to describe it as a chocolate latte, because that’s technically what it is, but it’s called a mocha.
Fun fact, the name of the beverage “Mocha” was named because in the late 18th century it was named after a port city called Mocha, Yemen, which was where coffee and leather was fist shipped. (also got the name from the color of leather)
Now I didn’t learn the Yemen part from working at a coffee house, that was from Google (Thanks google!), but how to make these drinks I learned from the coffee house years.
But the thing that confused me was the Vulcan Mocha. When I first heard it in that episode of Star Trek Voyager, I kinda did a head shake, was like, “Whaaaat? There’s such a thing as a Vulcan Mocha? Did the vulcans invent this, or is this purely a human invention and named after First Contact day or something?”
Because if my memory served me well, then chocolate was one of the few things that could intoxicate vulcans. Yep, a vulcan can get drunk from eating a Hershey Bar! They actually have their own “Alcoholic” beverages like a wine for example, but it’s sweet and tastes of chocolate, which I thought was interesting. So I was thinking, “But most mochas have chocolate in it. If vulcans can get intoxicated on the stuff, why…? Hmmm!”
One thought that went through my head was maybe it was a variation of the regular mocha. Like it was much much lighter on the chocolate, but heavier on the espresso for that extra burst of caffeine? I wasn’t sure. Made me want to jump right into the TV and talk to that coffee shop owner in the episode and say, “Psst! Hey! I’m a former barista from the 20th century. I wanna try the Vulcan mocha… also, can you teach me to make it? Please?”
If Spock were here, he might say, “I find it illogical to put intoxicating effective ingredients into a beverage meant to provide wakefulness and to make one more alert and productive in their activities.”
And Mr. Scott might say, “What’s wrong with ye? Ain’t ye never heard o’ a drink called Irish Coffee?”
“I have not, Mister Scott.”
“Aye, then ye haven’t lived, Mister Spock. Come wit’ me, yer’ not leaving withou’ trying it as least once…”
“No, thank you…”
This morning I had a dream where I was working in a coffee shop, and it was in total disarray. The shop had opened and nothing was ready. Coffees were not brewed, there was no espresso machine, someone started baking items like scones and muffins but they didn’t set the timer so half of those items got burnt. It was a mess. And somehow I got to thinking about the Vulcan Mocha (and wanting even just a regular mocha myself but i lacked the chocolate syrup at this time!) but decided to look it up.
Love that I was able to find an idea on your page! I also loved the idea that you made it as a tea as opposed to coffee, made sense. The name still clashes in my head though (A mocha being a tea? Hearsay!) but it still sounds like something I’d want to try.
Thanks for the read!
Bty, if you want a sweeter latte, you can always ask baristas to add a flavor or even sweetening items to the beverage while they’re making it (adding a flavor will cost extra, but not sugar packets), just be sure to let them know at the register when you place the order so they can mark it on the cup, especially if it’s a long line and they’re busy.
And of course, be good to everyone, tip those baristas, and smile. Have a great day!