If oil floats on water, how can olive oil infused coffee exist?

Question

I recently have been seeing posts about Starbucks bringing out a strange coffee with olive oil as an ingredient. I was always under the assumption that olive oil would separate from water and not mix. There must be something I’m not seeing here, and googling will not give me the answers. Do they do something to the olive oil perhaps? Thanks.

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Answer 1

You add an emulsifier that makes the water and oil able to bond and thus mix.

I think they use Lecithin in the starbucks products. It basically works by lecithin being able to bond with water on one side, and oil on the other, on a molecular level.