Creating a holiday cafe menu is an opportunity to bring familiar seasonal flavors to the menu while giving customers something new to look forward to. In this guide, we’ll walk through the process of building a balanced seasonal menu, from choosing an anchor drink to adding creative options that appeal to different tastes.
Why Seasonal Menus Matter
A long-held and time-honored tradition of the beverage industry, seasonal menus have become a staple way of increasing foot traffic, connecting with customers, and putting signature twists on classic favorites. Instead of customers struggling to decide what to get when everything looks good, a good seasonal menu gives them a solution: these are drinks you absolutely have to try before they’re gone.
That scarcity draws attention and very often makes the seasonal menu an incredibly important first impression for new customers, and an often-long-awaited reminder for returning customers of what keeps them coming. As late autumn’s bitter breeze blows ever colder and pumpkin spice season winds down, we wanted to go through the process of building our own holiday cafe menu to bring a little light to the thought and intention behind designing fun, creative, and memorable seasonal offerings.
How to Build a Holiday Cafe Menu
When building a seasonal cafe menu, you usually want two things: a vibe to use as a theme for your menu, and a classic, fan-favorite drink to anchor it. From there, you can introduce more creative options that appeal to different tastes and give customers a reason to explore your entire offering.
Anchor Drink: Miso Gingerbread
For our sample seasonal menu, we want to put together a collection of warm, comfy, and cozy drinks anchored around a traditional winter classic: gingerbread. Although very delicious, gingerbread lattes have become quite mainstream. A little creativity can go a long way to spice up your menu and elevate a customer’s experience.
To elevate our gingerbread syrup, we substituted the traditional molasses for white miso, adding depth and complexity to a nostalgic holiday favorite. Unique, complex, and a little creative, this syrup lends to a delicious Miso Gingerbread Latte, creating the perfect anchor drink to build out the rest of our sample holiday cafe menu.
Miso Gingerbread Syrup
Ingredients
- 600g water
- 300g regular granulated sugar
- 300g dark brown sugar
- 60g white miso
- 50g ginger
- 3 cinnamon sticks
- 10 whole allspice berries
- 10 whole cloves
- 6 whole black peppercorns
- 1 vanilla bean, split and scraped
- Pinch of salt
Method
1. Combine all ingredients in a saucepan.
2. Simmer for 8 minutes.
3. Strain before using.
4. If using ground cinnamon instead of cinnamon sticks, add it toward the end of the cooking process and strain twice. Use approximately 6g of cinnamon powder.
Drink #1: Malted Vanilla
As fun as simply reaching into a bag of creative drink ideas is, a good seasonal menu has structure to it. You need to make sure that all customers will find a drink (ideally more than one!) to fall in love with.
Our anchor drink, Miso Gingerbread, serves as the most recognizable and probably most approachable drink for customers. Next, we want to go for a complementary flavor, but maybe something a bit out of left field. Since this isn’t our anchor drink, we have slightly more wiggle room. We want to provide customers with something exciting and creative, yet still rooted in themes of warmth, comfort, and familiarity.
For a fun, unique spin on a traditional vanilla latte, we added a little malted milk powder to a regular vanilla syrup, then garnished the drink with dark cocoa powder and orange zest. The result is a perfect companion for our Miso Gingerbread. Warm, fun, and very, very yummy, our Malted Vanilla Latte is an outstanding second drink for our holiday cafe menu.
Malted Vanilla Syrup
Ingredients
- 600g water
- 600g sugar
- 5 vanilla beans, split and scraped
- 100g malted milk powder
Method
1. Combine the water, sugar, vanilla beans, vanilla seeds, and malted milk powder.
2. Simmer for 8 minutes.
3. Leave the vanilla beans in the finished syrup for further infusion.
Drink #2: Cranberry Orange Matcha
With the Miso Gingerbread and the Malted Vanilla, we’ve got our bases covered. We have our traditional offerings that customers will immediately recognize and are eager to try. That gives us even more room for creativity while also having the task of appealing to drinkers that probably wouldn’t gravitate toward traditional, classic flavors.
For this drink, we took a little inspiration from color theory. Every color has a complementary color, or one that’s opposite of it on the color wheel. Complementary colors serve to create a dynamic sense of vibrance, excitement, and interest.
This drink hopes to do the same in our menu. Taking inspiration from a fun holiday twist on a normal and beloved Strawberry Matcha, we decided to make a Cranberry Orange Matcha.
Garnished with a little sprig of rosemary for a piney aroma, this unique recipe is a cozy, wintry delicacy that will give customers a reason to keep coming back.
Cranberry Syrup
Ingredients
- 400g water
- 400g sugar
- 200g cranberries
- 50g orange juice
Method
1. Combine the water, sugar, cranberries, and orange juice.
2. Simmer for 8 minutes.
3. Blend the mixture.
4. Strain twice before using.
Wildcard Drink: Mistletoe Cider
Rounding out our menu, we find that we’ve left very few stones unturned. We’ve got something for just about everyone: the Miso Gingerbread and Malted Vanilla for those seeking creative yet familiar coffee drinks, and the Cranberry Orange Matcha for those seeking a fruity non-coffee latte. The thing we’re lacking at this point is a non-milk-based refreshing drink, something approachable to those that don’t want coffee and don’t want matcha.
Our last drink also has the privilege of getting to be arguably the most creative. Since we’ve done well to cover our bases, this can be a memorable wildcard drink that’s meant to be special. Using our delicious new holiday tea blend alongside apple cider and a teensy bit of honey, this Mistletoe Cider is exactly that: where else can you find this?
This drink, still very true to our cozy and comfy theme, is an easy drinker. Mistletoe Cider is enjoyable hot or iced and provides something that’s sure to stay in the minds of anyone who’s tried it.
Finishing Touches
While every good seasonal menu needs its well-crafted drinks, there are many customers looking for the basics. Adding some robust single-origins and cold-weather tea blends will allow your customers to still feel included in the holiday spirit. Here’s what we think will work best this year.
Holiday Coffee Menu Offerings
This offering produces such a warm and cozy feeling with its intense body and smooth, silky mouthfeel. It has a richness similar to other wet-hulled Indonesian offerings that shine at a darker roast level.
Classic, bold, earthy, sweet! Sumatra is known for its heavier bodied profile with subtle cedar notes and that deep chocolatey, molasses like sweetness.
This coffee stands out from the rest because of its spice notes. It gives off that holiday feel with a vanilla sweetness and chocolatey body to tie it all in.
Holiday Tea Menu Offerings
Our newest offering, Mistletoe is a wintery blend with light earthy notes and hints of bright, fruity flavor. Inspired by the festive season, enjoy Mistletoe curled up by the fireplace or as a nightcap after a holiday feast.
Reminiscent of chocolate peppermint bark, this blend is perfect for the holidays when you’re craving a little treat. Roasted cacao nibs and peppermint meet over a base of honey bush for a sweet and refreshing brew.
The holiday season means flu season, and what better remedy is there than an immunity-boosting tea blend? Chamomile and ginger can help with inflammation while lemon myrtle gives a boost of vitamin c, keeping you warm and cozy all winter long.
