Both Thai iced coffee and Vietnamese iced coffee are delicious, cold and sweet coffee drinks made with strong coffee that we enjoy most on a hot summer day.
These two are great iced coffee beverages that are very similar. Obviously one originated from Thailand and the other from Vietnam, but here we’ll uncover a few more differences.
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Read More: Iced Latte vs Iced Coffee: Here’s How They Differ
Thai Iced Coffee vs Vietnamese Iced Coffee
Vietnamese iced coffee, or cà phê sữa dá, is Vietnamese for coffee with milk. It’s made with a dark roast coffee brewed with a metal coffee filter called a phin. It is then poured over ice and mixed with a tablespoon or two of sweetened condensed milk.
Cafe Du Monde’s famous Coffee and Chicory, a blend of coffee and ground chicory root is frequently used in America to make Vietnamese coffee. The added chicory gives the coffee a chocolaty flavor and reduces the bitterness of the dark roasted coffee. Then add in the sweetened condensed milk pour it over ice and you’re in for a treat.
Make our Vietnamese egg coffee at home.
Thai iced coffee, or oliang translates to black iced coffee. It’s similarly made using a strong, dark roast coffee like in Vietnamese iced coffee. But while some recipes will also call for condensed milk, others just put in sugar and the main difference, cardamom. Adding in a teaspoon or two of ground cardamom to Thai iced coffee also helps to balance the bitterness of the dark roast coffee similarly to the chicory in the Vietnamese coffee.
Make our Thai iced coffee at home.
Here are the three main differences between Thai iced coffee and Vietnamese iced coffee in a little more depth:
1. The Brewing Tool
Both iced coffees use a different tool to brew the coffee.
For Vietnamese iced coffee, you’ll need a metal coffee filter, also called a phin. To use it, add ground coffee into the filter, screw on the top and set it on top of your coffee mug. We screw on the top filter until snug then loosen it a quarter turn to prevent it from tightening. We also pour in 2 to 3 tablespoons of hot water to moisten and swell the coffee before pouring in more water. You can read more about using a phin here. It drips slowly but it’s worth the wait.
To make the coffee for Thai iced coffee, use a sock strainer. It’s made of cotton with a metal handle attached. Simply put the strainer in your cup or in a pot, add coffee ground to the strainer and pour in hot water. You can let it steep for a bit before taking it out of the cup.
The benefits of using one of these sock strainers is that it’s portable, can be used for more than just making Thai iced coffee and is environmentally friendly (no need to use paper filters.)
2. The Coffee
Vietnamese iced coffee is made with a dark roast coffee. It’s frequently made, especially in the US with Cafe du Monde’s Coffee and Chicory, which originated in New Orleans, Louisiana. The iconic cafe opened in 1862 and is known for its fried squares of dough called beignets and cafe au lait, made with Coffee and Chicory.
Cafe du Monde’s association with Vietnamese iced coffee goes back to the 1800s when the French colonized Vietnam, bringing coffee with them. Louisiana was also part of France until 1803. Apparently, both Vietnam and Louisiana kept the French cafe culture, so when Vietnamese refugees came to the United States during the Vietnam War, those who settled in New Orleans were familiar with coffee. The French had already been adding chicory to coffee since the 18th century. More about the interesting history can be found here.
Apart from using any dark roast coffee or Cafe du Monde coffee, blends from Trung Nguyen, Vietnam’s popular coffee company are also used. And if you’re looking to make a true Vietnamese iced coffee, make it with dark roast coffee beans that are actually from Vietnam. Check out Nguyen Coffee Supply. Their coffee beans are grown in Vietnam and are roasted in Brooklyn, NYC.
Thai iced coffee also calls for dark roast coffee beans. Though we usually make ours using two shots of dark roast coffee espresso, you can also use a convenient powder to make it. The Pantai Oliang Powder from Thailand is a mix of coffee with soy and corn. Though it’s called a powder, it doesn’t dissolve into hot water like instant coffee so you will still need to use the sock filter.
3. The Ingredients
Now that the coffee is brewed with the right tools, you’ll want to add ice to both. But then there’s a difference when it comes to the sweeteners and flavors.
For Vietnamese iced coffee, sweetened condensed milk is added. It makes the iced coffee really sweet and is why it tastes so good. That’s usually all that’s added to make Vietnamese iced coffee, though another popular Vietnamese coffee drink to try is Vietnamese egg coffee. Yes, egg is added to coffee. It doesn’t sound like something you’d usually add to coffee, but it is really good.
And for Thai iced coffee, there are multiple variations. Sweetened condensed milk is sometimes added or sometimes sugar, but most will add cardamom along with either of the sweeteners. When cardamom is added to Thai iced coffee, it’s able to help balance out the bitterness of the coffee. We use a bit of cardamom powder and mix it to brewed coffee, which makes the coffee so different from anything you might have had before.
In Summary: Thai vs Vietnamese Iced Coffee
- Coffee in Vietnamese iced coffee is brewed with a metal coffee filter called a phin. For Thai iced coffee, a cotton sock strainer is traditionally used.
- Vietnamese iced coffee is frequently made with Cafe du Monde coffee, but really to be called Vietnamese coffee should be made with beans from Vietnam like ones from Nguyen Coffee Supply. Thai iced coffee is made with a dark roast coffee and also Oliang powder.
- Sweetened condensed milk is added to Vietnamese iced coffee. Meanwhile, the recipe varies for Thai iced coffee but the differentiator is cardamom, which is often on the list of ingredients.
