I get a green tea no water, and I put ALOT of strawberries in it. There’s way too much sugar in everything.

Diabetic barista here… I feel your pain. It’s really easy to get lost in the sauce during your shift. The added stress and options of the holidays don’t help much either and I’ve been catching myself slipping recently too. :(

I’m a big proponent of waning yourself off the sugar. It’s really easy to get desensitized to sugar, so slowly decreasing the pumps you put in your favorite drinks can be really helpful! I straight up trained myself to enjoy black iced coffee this way. Someone else mentioned having a “water only” break. Listen to your body. If it’s telling you it’s thirsty, listen to it and opt for water over caffeine and sugar. There’s no rule that says you must make a drink every break, and having one less drink a day is a big change!

My favorite moderately sweetened drinks:
- Green tea lemonade w/ 0.5 pumps of peppermint

- blonde lattes made with coconut milk are naturally sweet so they’re very drinkable with little to no syrup

- brown sugar oatmilk is a great example of a delicious drink that only gets half pumps- you can sub half pumps of any syrup/sauce and it’s still very good

Good luck and try to be kind to yourself!

$1 is a calorie calculator developed by a partner, give it a whirl and share it. The sugar and calories in some beverages is off the hook unhealthy, good for you for paying attention!

I also hate SF vanilla so I just try to reduce the amount of syrup I put in drinks. I only put 1 or 2 pumps in and I think it still tastes really good. Other ways to reduce sugar/calories are to get no whip and nonfat or no dairy milk, or just change to a different recipe to create the same flavors but lower sugar/calories. For example, a white mocha could become an americano w/ a few pumps of white mocha. I’m pretty good at coming up with low-cal/sugar alternatives for drinks so if you have a specific favorite lmk and I could try to help you come up with something similar!

My go-to is iced green tea with stevia, light water, 2-3 for a grande or 4 for a venti. Or a passiontango tea with one stevia to offset the 'tang' of the tea.

For coffee drinks I would do cold brew with regular cream and stevia as well.

I only do teas now as I'm in the same situation as you and realized I don't need that caffeine or sugar to cope or get through my day. Whenever I think about my favorite drinks or sweets I tell myself it's just an addiction and I don't actually need it. Eventually I stopped craving it.

Sorry if that triggered anyone

I try to limit myself to 3 shots of espresso per shift so it helps me a bit.. I will make a tall shaken espresso with no classic, 2 pumps sfv (you can't really taste the vanilla), 1 pump chai, 1 scoop malt powder, and cinnamon into the shaker. Shake the heck out of it for the foam and add oatmilk. I also like the chestnut praline so I'll have a short with oatmilk. I also try to force myself to drink at least one cup of water on a break as my drink. So no sweet drink on at least 1 break.

Honestly a flat white with your milk choice and a little bit of sprinkles on top. Relatively low calorie but still acceptable to me