Brooklyn (vanilla and caramel frappuccino)

A Starbucks on Court Street in Brooklyn made a special vanilla bean “frappuccino” (a trademarked coffee, water and milk drink) with a caramel swirl for some of its customers. In June 2008, this Starbucks put up a sign calling it “The Brooklyn.” The concoction was advertised on the chalkboard sign as “The New All Time Favorite Drink.”
   
   
Wikipedia: Frappuccino
Frappuccino is the name and registered trademark of a Starbucks blended ice beverage and a bottled coffee beverage.
 
History
Some sources say that a very similar frozen coffee drink was invented by The Coffee Connection, a small Boston-based chain later acquired by Starbucks. The name Frappuccino was coined by The Coffee Connection. In this etymology, the term frappuccino is a blend of frappé, the Greek term for milkshake, and cappuccino, the coffee drink with a milky topping (see below for alternate etymologies)
 
Frappuccino was trademarked by The Coffee Connection, and that trademark was acquired by Starbucks when they bought The Coffee Connection, a 22 store chain with a huge following that Starbucks could not compete with in the Boston market, around 1995. The original recipe was completely different and used a unique preparation process using simple ingredients to achieve its appeal.
 
Similar frozen coffee drinks were served starting in 1988 by the Seattle chain Cinnabon under the names Mochalatta and Caramelatta.
 
Varieties
Original
The original frappuccino is a blend of ice and a mix constituted of coffee, water, milk, and various syrups. The result is a beverage that is a little icy like a slush, but with a consistency that is similar to a thin milkshake.
 
The Brooklyn Paper 
June 14, 2008 / News
Starbucks names shake for boro
By Sarah Portlock
The Brooklyn Paper
Manhattan has its eponymous bourbon and vermouth. And Brooklyn now has its … ice milk and caramel syrup?
 
Apparently, a Starbucks vanilla bean frappuccino — with a caramel swirl! — will be our borough’s star in the culinary firmament.
 
Created by a Starbucks district manager after noticing high school girls customizing the traditional vanilla bean frappuccino, “The Brooklyn” consists of nothing more than the ubiquitous chain’s existing drink, enhanced with a bit more sugar.
 
A Starbucks on Court Street broke the “news” this week by putting out an A-frame sign heralding, “The new all time favorite drink…the Brooklyn.”
 
Oh, and did we mention that it’s 40 more cents ($4.90 for a venti!) — and 20 more calories (620, but who’s counting?) — than the standard frappuccino.
(...)
“It” is merely blended milk, vanilla powder, crushed ice, and whipped cream.
 
And that all-important caramel swirl.
(...)
Caramel is merely burned sugar — and if nothing else, the history of Brooklyn is the history of American sugar refining. By the late 19th-century, sugar plants here produced more than half the sugar consumed in the United States.
 
And now, thanks to Starbucks, we’re consuming it back.
— with Jessica Firger
 
The Brooklyn Paper
June 14, 2008 / GO Brooklyn / Brooklyn Restaurants / Breaking Chews
Tasty restaurant gossip
By Adam Rathe and Kate Ray
The Brooklyn Paper
It seems that every bartender has a different idea of what a “Brooklyn” is, and now coffee shops are getting in on the confusion. Starbucks cafes across the borough have been spotted with signs advertising “The Brooklyn,” a blend of the coffee behemoth’s vanilla and caramel “Frappuccino” mix topped with whipped cream and caramel sauce. 
 
New York (NY) Times - City Room
June 20, 2008,  11:07 am
Yo, Brooklyn Brand, What’s Up?
By Jake Mooney
If you think Brooklyn — or rather, the marketed image of Brooklyn — has been a bit overexposed lately, it may not be your imagination. There was the much-ballyhooed opening, on Wednesday, of Ikea Brooklyn, the latest branch of the Swedish furniture chain.
 
And word, late last week, that Starbucks had named a drink for the borough.
 
That last one turned out to be not exactly true — a spokeswoman for the company said this week that just one store, on its own, had informally named the drink, and that the rest of the chain would not follow suit.