Summer Drink Menu 2025
The summer heat is clearly here to stay, and so are some of your favorite refreshing drinks. We’re keeping the Ube Latte and the Main Squeeze on this season. We’re excited to also bring back two crowd favorites: The Orange You Glad and the Kopi & Kaya. In addition to these four, you’ll find an incredible cafe exclusive drink at each location as well.
Orange You Glad
Warmer weather is all the rage right now, and so is pairing orange juice and coffee together. We’re doing it right with this dreamy drink that is sure to put a smile on your face. A curiously delicious combination of orange juice, cold brew concentrate, cream, vanilla, and old-fashioned bitters, all served over ice. Trust us, you don’t want to sleep on this one.
This orange juice-based drink has a long history here at Tala. We originally launched a very similar version in 2019 with underwhelming results. “Orange juice and coffee??” was something we heard a lot. Internally, however, we were all slamming them down like crazy. A couple of years later, the idea resurfaced as orange juice coffee was making its rounds on TikTok. We tweaked the recipe a little, and the Organe You Glad was born, and the people were ready for it this time. Now it, is one of our most beloved crowd favorites. If you haven’t had a chance to try it, make sure you give it a shot this summer. You’ll be glad you did. 😉
Kopi & Kaya
Take a journey to Singapore with this uniquely sweet island homage. Kaya is a classic southeast asain coconut palm jam. Pair this with coffee (Kopi) and you have a cherished Singaporean breakfast. Made with coconut milk, kaya syrup, and espresso layered together with your choice of milk.
Kaya toast is everywhere in Singapore, and a delicacy in the Tong household. Each time Stefan’s dad takes a trip back home to Singapore, he brings us back some Kaya jam. When he asks how many jars, our answer is always as many as you can fit in your suitcase. We enjoy a liberal spread of jam over buttered toast. Kaya is sweet and earthy, making it a delicious and unique complement to coffee.
The Ube Latte
Our take on the award winning, cult classic Ube Donut from our friends at Gurnee Donuts. Ube is a purple root vegetable that tastes like a vanilla wafer cookie. Trust us, it’s delicious! Made with espresso, Ube syrup, sweetened condensed milk, coconut milk, and milk. Oddly enough, it pairs well with its pastry counterpart!
Main Squeeze
Long story short, this is definitely not your average lemonade stand lemonade. We’ve elevated ours with strawberry-basil syrup, sparkling water, Angostura bitters, and basil leaf garnish. You’re going to love these fresh spring flavors!
Cafe Exclusives
Highwood
Rhuberry Matcha
The Highwood team chose to embrace the matcha craze with a summery twist: strawberry rhubarb. Nothing screams summer like rhubarb goodies, and this well-crafted drink is no exception to that. The challenge with this drink—as is often the case—was getting the rhubarb to shine even when paired with the espresso. You never know how subtle a flavor is until you try to put it with coffee. In the end, we feel like this was the exact right refreshing combination of flavors.
Libertyville
Funky Monkey
This bananas foster syrup was an original of Marissa, who loves to dabble in syrup-making at home. Creating a banana recipe to scale wasn’t an easy feat (hello freezer full of fresh bananas), but it was too good a flavor not to embrace.
Winnetka
Summer Blues
When the Winnetka team eagerly submitted their summer drink idea of a blueberry maple latte with lemon we all laughed because it is almost the exact same thing as the beloved violet bequreegaued—the spring drink we had last year with a cult following. In fact, we had some pretty upset people this year when we didn’t bring it back. So to all the violet Beauregard lovers, go to Winnetka to enjoy its faternal twin, the Summer Blues.
Which drink will you try first?
Joann Tong
Joanna is one of the owners here at Tala, heading up Operations and Strategy. Born and raised in Minnesota, she moved to Illinois in 2014 with no intention of staying long-term until the idea of Tala came to light. When not in the office or the cafe, you can find her in a forest preserve enjoying the outdoors or at home hanging out with her cat.