Recipe
Cà phê dừa
Vietnamese coconut coffee
Roughly: ka fe ZOO-uh
Strong Vietnamese coffee poured over a thick, icy coconut blend. Sweet, cold and easy to make at home.
How to make Vietnamese coconut coffee
IngredientsFor 1 glass
- Dark-roast Vietnamese coffee, preferably robusta, ground medium-coarse20 gabout 3 tbsp
- Hot water, just off the boil100 mlabout 7 tbsp
- Full-fat canned coconut milk120 mlabout ½ cup
Use full-fat coconut milk from a can, not the thin coconut drink sold in cartons.
- Sweetened condensed milk30 mlabout 2 tbsp
- Ice cubes6–8
Leave these out if you freeze the coconut milk first. See the tips below.
Equipment
- A phin filter, or another brewer that makes strong coffee
- A blender
- A tall glass
Method
- 1
Brew the coffee
Brew the coffee with the hot water in a phin. Let it cool to room temperature, or brew it ahead and keep it in the fridge.
- 2
Blend the coconut
Stir or shake the coconut milk until smooth, because canned coconut milk often separates. Blend it with the condensed milk and ice in short pulses until thick enough to hold its shape, like soft-serve.
- 3
Fill the glass
Spoon the coconut mixture into a tall glass, leaving 2–3 cm at the top for the coffee.
- 4
Add the coffee
Pour the cooled coffee slowly over the coconut and let it run down through it. Serve straight away with a long spoon, layered or stirred.
Tips for the best coconut coffee
Use full-fat coconut milk
Fat is what turns frozen coconut into a smooth slush you can eat with a spoon. Look for a can with at least 10 g of fat per 100 g. Light coconut milk and carton coconut drinks have too little, and they blend into something thin and icy.
Cool the coffee first
Warm coffee melts a channel straight through the coconut and leaves you with a thin drink. Room temperature works. Fridge-cold is better.
Freeze the coconut milk for a thicker drink
Pour the coconut milk into an ice-cube tray the night before. Blend the frozen cubes with the condensed milk and leave out the ice. With no plain water in the glass, the slush comes out denser and does not water down as it melts.
If the cubes are rock-hard, let them sit for a few minutes, then blend in short pulses.
Adjust the sweetness
Start with 30 ml of condensed milk. Taste the coconut mixture before you fill the glass, and blend in a little more if you want it sweeter. Use less next time if it was too much.
Simple variations
No phin? A double espresso or a strong AeroPress brew stands in well. A Moka pot works too, but its coffee is weaker, so use all of it. The ratios are in Vietnamese coffee without a phin.
Dairy-free or vegan? Sweetened condensed milk is made from cow’s milk. Swap in an oat or coconut condensed milk and the method stays the same. Taste the coconut mixture before you fill the glass, because these are not all equally sweet.
Richer? Use canned coconut cream instead of coconut milk. The international Codex standard sets coconut cream at 20% fat or more, against 10% for coconut milk, so it blends thicker and heavier. Taste before you add all the condensed milk.
No blender? Freeze the coconut milk into cubes, seal them in a strong bag and crush them with a rolling pin, then stir in the condensed milk. The texture is coarser, but it is recognisably the same drink.
What is Vietnamese coconut coffee?
Cà phê dừa means coconut coffee. Menus often use the fuller name, cà phê cốt dừa. Cốt is a concentrate or extract, so cốt dừa is the thick cream pressed from coconut flesh, not coconut water or a syrup. The Vietnamese coffee words page explains how these names stack.
It is a modern café drink, not an old tradition like cà phê sữa đá. Saveur, writing about Saigon’s coffee in 2026, singles out the version at the Cộng Cà Phê chain: coconut cream, condensed milk and ice blended into a thick frozen base under strong Vietnamese coffee. No source we found records who made the first one.
Questions people ask
- Can I make Vietnamese coconut coffee ahead?
- Partly. Brew the coffee and freeze the coconut milk into cubes the day before. Blend the coconut mixture just before you serve it, because it starts to melt as soon as it is made.
- What does Vietnamese coconut coffee taste like?
- Cold, sweet and thick, with the coconut first and the coffee behind it. Dark-roast robusta is commonly described as cocoa and dark chocolate, and the coconut and condensed milk take the edge off its bitterness.
- How many calories are in Vietnamese coconut coffee?
- About 346 by our estimate, calculated from USDA composition data rather than measured from a glass. Roughly 222 come from the 120 ml of coconut milk and about 123 from the condensed milk. Made with coconut cream, it will be higher.
- How much caffeine is in Vietnamese coconut coffee?
- All of it comes from the 20 g of coffee; the coconut and condensed milk add none. We estimate roughly 320–490 mg for a 20 g robusta phin, calculated from published bean composition and extraction data rather than measured.
- Is it the same as coconut-flavoured coffee?
- No. Toasted-coconut coffee beans, coconut syrup and coconut creamer are all sold as coconut coffee. Cà phê dừa uses none of them: the coconut is real coconut milk, and it is the biggest thing in the glass.
Sources
Figures on this page come from the following. Where a claim is an estimate or a common description rather than a measurement, the text says so.
- Nuts, coconut milk, canned (liquid expressed from grated meat and water) (FDC ID 170173)USDA FoodData Central, SR Legacy · 2019-04 · accessed 2026-10-16Canned coconut milk at 197 kcal per 100 g, with 226 g per cup. These give about 113 g and roughly 222 calories for the 120 ml in this recipe.
- Milk, canned, condensed, sweetened (FDC ID 171275)USDA FoodData Central, SR Legacy · 2019-04 · accessed 2026-10-16Sweetened condensed milk at 321 kcal per 100 g, with 38.2 g per US fluid ounce, which gives about 123 calories for the 30 ml in this recipe.
- Proposed Draft Standard for Aqueous Coconut Products (Appendix II, advanced to Step 5 of the Codex Procedure)FAO, in a report of the Codex Alimentarius Commission (document X4285) · accessed 2026-10-16The composition table grading coconut products by fat: light coconut milk at 5.0% minimum, coconut milk at 10.0% minimum and coconut cream at 20.0% minimum. This FAO page carries the proposed draft rather than the adopted CODEX STAN 240-2003, which we could not obtain; the figures match what Tetra Pak reports for the adopted standard.
- The Chemistry of Coconut Milk and Cream (chapter 8)The Coconut Handbook, Tetra Pak · accessed 2026-10-16The handbook reporting that CODEX STAN 240-2003 requires at least 10% fat for coconut milk and at least 20% for coconut cream. Used as a second reading of the adopted standard alongside the FAO draft.
- 10 Essential Vietnamese Coffee Drinks and Where to Try Them in SaigonSaveur (Dan Q. Dao) · 2026-08-31 · accessed 2026-10-16Cà phê cốt dừa at Cộng Cà Phê described as the chain's now-iconic version, blending coconut cream, condensed milk and ice into a thick frozen base paired with strong Vietnamese coffee, served with a long spoon. The report does not say who created the drink.
- cốt — Vietnamese–English entryVDict · accessed 2026-10-16Cốt given as a noun with, among other senses, a concentrate or extract. The dictionary has no entry for the compound cốt dừa, so the reading of it here is ours.
- Reliable Discrimination of Green Coffee Beans Species: A Comparison of UV-Vis-Based Determination of Caffeine and Chlorogenic Acid with Non-Targeted Near-Infrared SpectroscopyFoods 9(6):788 (Adnan, Naumann, Mörlein and Pawelzik) · 2020-06 · accessed 2026-10-16Mean caffeine measured at 2.9% of dry weight in robusta green beans against 1.8% in arabica, the basis for treating the 20 g robusta dose as the only source of caffeine worth counting in this glass.
