Jennifer Garner had a heart-racing experience the first time she tried coffee.
During an appearance on The Kelly Clarkson Show on Thursday, Oct. 3, Garner, 52, shared the hilarious story of how she had “a very specific first day of coffee day in my life.”
As the Alias alum and Clarkson, 42, sipped from their coffee mugs, Garner recounted a time about 30 years ago when she was living in New York City, working at a restaurant and auditioning for acting jobs. She landed a role in an episode of Law & Order to play a potential love interest opposite star Benjamin Bratt.
Ahead of filming, Bratt, 60, suggested that the two meet and have coffee together to get to know one another before shooting their scenes. Despite never having had coffee before, Garner — who was in her early 20s at the time — told Bratt, “Oh yeah, absolutely.”
“I was being very grown up,” she said to Clarkson, adding in an exaggerated “adult” voice, “Yeah, of course, coffee is exactlywhat I would like to have.”
Garner and Bratt met up, and the Miss Congeniality star ordered a double latte with an extra shot.
“So it was three shots of espresso in a latte!” Garner explained to Clarkson. “And I was like, ‘I’ll have the same.’ I’m sure I put like a cup of sugar into it.”
As if Garner hadn’t already reached her caffeine quota, Bratt then said to her, “I’ll have another one,” and she replied, “Yeah, sounds good,” and followed suit.
She said all of the coffee left her feeling “so jittery” afterwards that she had to cancel an audition she had scheduled for that day.
“Almost probably you had a heart attack,” Clarkson suggested, prompting Garner to reply, “I could feel like I could taste my heartbeat, you know?”
Jennifer Garner.
BG004/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images
While the Deadpool & Wolverine star’s first introduction to coffee was a rocky one, she went on to become a big fan of the beverage. Back in April, she even joked to PEOPLE that her “oldest, best relationship” is with coffee.
“If I could marry coffee I would,” she said at the time. “I love coffee.”
She noted that she likes to mix up her coffee routine, as she shared some of her favorite orders. “Almost always, I’ll have an almond milk cappuccino, but sometimes I go flat white and sometimes I go cortado,” she said.
And just like her first coffee experience with Bratt, she doesn’t stop at just one cup.
Jennifer Garner.
Albert L. Ortega/Getty
“I always do a super early workout and I need a coffee before that to get me started — and that’s usually an Americano,” Garner told PEOPLE. “After I work out, I feel like I deserve a reward, so then I’ll have my cappuccino. And then I probably have one more coffee in me mid-morning, and then I’m done for the day. If I have one later, it’s decaf.”
Garner’s teenage daughter Violet shares her mom’s passion for coffee. The Family Switchstar said the 18-year-old has taken up three of her six profiles on her KitchenAid coffee machine at home.
“She is always like, ‘I like extra water in this. I like this extra hot.’ She’s very fancy,” Garner said. “She’s so specific because she’s cool. If you’re 18, you’re super cool.”
