The Google Doodle today is about celebrating the flat white. When you look up the origins of the flat white it seems there is some contention about whether it started in Australia or New Zealand. It is supposed to be similar to the argument about pavlova. I can add something to this.

It was late 1981. I had just returned from a 2 year OE in the UK. My previous employer in New Zealand had called me in the UK and said he had just bought fancy new computer and wanted me to come work on it. I'm a software developer, and for me this was a very attractive offer. Plus we were thinking of coming home anyway.

There had been some changes. A colleague I had enjoyed working with, Paul, had moved to Sydney, Australia, but he still worked for the same employer because we now had an Australian client, a big one. And much of my work would be for that client. The first thing I had to do, though, was fly to Melbourne and attend a conference. Paul was going to it too. There would be a lot of information about the new machine presented. Although I had been all the way to the UK and traveled around Europe by now I had yet to visit Australia. Paul had lived there for a while now.

We went out to some restaurant in Melbourne after a day at the conference. I very clearly recall Paul explaining the terms flat white, short black and long black to me when we came to order coffee. That was 1982. But remember Paul had been living in Sydney which is where he had become familiar with these terms. I had not heard them in the UK, nor in NZ.

The Wikipedia story suggests the New Zealand invention happened in 1989, and that is far too late. I can't really recall but I am fairly sure I was going to restaurants and cafes in New Zealand before 1989 and ordering a flat white.

But there's another twist to this.

I remember ordering a 'cappucino' in Italy in mid 1980. It wasn't called a flat white but that was what I got. In New Zealand and Australia a cappucino is much more frothy. In Italy it was not. I went back to Italy in the early 90s and spent several weeks there. Most days I ordered a cappucino and every time I got what I now recognised as a flat white.

So the term flat white, as far as I can see, is Australian. The actual drink is simply an Italian cappucino which probably dates from when the Italians came up with espresso machines and they were more subtle about frothing their milk.

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