Dunkin’ Cookie Butter Cold Brew & Donut Review: A Super Sweet Pairing

In Elite Daily's series Chef's Kiss, we taste the latest food and drink trends to help you figure out which ones you definitely don’t want to sleep on. In this piece, we taste the new Cookie Butter Cold Brew and Cookie Butter Donut from Dunkin’.

Proud members of the “iced coffee even when it’s snowing” camp are about to be in for a real treat. On Nov. 2, Dunkin’ kicked off the holiday season with a new Cookie Butter Cold brew that’s sure to make your holiday coffee runs extra cheery. There’s also a mouthwateringly sweet Cookie Butter Donut to pair with it. If you’ve been counting down the days until the grand return of your seasonal faves, you might be quick to write off the new menu items, but this Dunkin’ Cookie Butter Cold Brew and Donut review might just have your interest piqued. I tried the brew and bite for myself, and here’s how sweet the pairing actually is.

It’s time to trade in your PSLs for jingle bells, because the holidays are in full swing at Dunkin’. The New England-based coffee chain’s holiday menu for 2022 includes returning classics like the Peppermint Mocha Latte and the Holiday Blend, but the real star of the show is the Cookie Butter Cold Brew. Made with slow-steeped cold brew, the sip combines notes of sweet brown sugar and warm baked cookie flavors, and it’s topped with a creamy Cookie Butter Cold Foam and a dusting of crunchy cookie butter crumbles. It’s basically like it grandma’s freshly baked cookies were a drink.

The holiday goodness doesn’t end there. The new Cookie Butter Donut features a sweet, yeast donut shell bursting with cookie butter buttercreme filling that’s topped with a layer of maple-flavored icing and a dusting of crushed cookie pieces.

With so many holiday items to choose from, it’s hard to know if the new offerings are worth your time. But if you’ve got a strong sweet tooth (emphasis on strong), you’re not gonna want to pass up this pairing.

Dunkin’ Cookie Butter Cold Brew Review

I was immediately able to smell the brown sugar and cinnamon spices, but the cold brew flavor came through strong on the first taste. Soon, a perfect balance of brown sugar syrup and Arabica flavors was revealed. The two ingredients blend together in a way that makes the cold brew go down extra smooth — and as someone who doesn’t like her coffee to be too strong, I really appreciated how the sweet flavors somewhat masked the coffee. If you like sweet drinks, this sip will definitely meet all your sugar needs, but if you’re a coffee purist, the cold brew flavor might get lost too often for your liking.

My favorite part of the drink was definitely the Cookie Butter Cold Foam. It gives off serious snickerdoodle vibes, and the sprinkling of cookie pieces on top gives the creamy foam a fun texture. Plus, it’s the main part of the drink that really gives off cookie butter vibes.

Dunkin’ Cookie Butter Donut Review

A maple scent took center stage on my first whiff, and though the maple icing had a mild sweetness to it, the real sugar rush came from the crunchy cookie pieces. I found my way to the maple filling on my second bite. It’s much creamier than the icing, and it really puts the cookie butter flavor over the top. Not to mention, the subtle hint of cinnamon in the filling made the dessert taste like maple candies, which scored major brownie, er, donut, points with me.

If you’re worried about the cold brew and donut combo overloading your tastebuds with cookie butter flavor, don’t be. The maple flavors set the donut apart from the drink so much so that you almost forget they were made to be a pair. What you need to be prepare for is a sugar rush — by the time I finished the donut, I was on the verge of sweetness overload, and I couldn’t even finish the cold brew. So, if you’re more of a “slightly sweet” person, you may want to choose one or the other.

Whether you try them together or on their own, the Cookie Butter Cold Brew and Cookie Butter Donut might just find their way onto your holiday roster — as long as the sugar rush doesn’t get to be too much. You may even be able to swap out your Speculoos jar for Dunkin’ runs all season long.