coffee

Farcaster-native research: https://paragraph.xyz/@matthewb | prev. Juicebox, Nouns, RAW DAO | casting about coffee, hi-fi, and other rabbit holes

@matthewb can you confirm the correct size for a flat white plz

this is a reasonable take from @marlo but there is a lot of nuance to unpack here. some notes on trad espresso culture vs. third wave:

* old school italian coffee
@brileigh and I often frequent an old school Italian cafe that has been around for 50+ years. the coffee they serve is roasted to within an inch of its life (very dark) and prepared hastily without much fuss.

a cappuccino is served as a single shot of espresso with dense foamed milk spooned on top with very little (if any) steamed milk mixed in. the cup is quite small, like 5-6oz. they lightly sprinkle some sweet chocolate powder on top.

this is close to the original definition of a cappuccino, which is a 1:1:1 ratio of espresso : steamed milk : foam. I would loosely categorize this as traditional italian coffee, though drink definitions have always been fluid and vary by cafe, region, etc.

not universal, varies depending on the cafe and region. as a beverage it’s native to aus/nz rather than italian coffee culture, but is now pretty common worldwide.

typically a flat white is smaller than a capp which is 8oz, so 6oz would be “textbook”. but I’ve seen them served larger even though I’d argue that it becomes a latte by the time it’s 12oz.

thread about capps is here for reference:

not universal, varies depending on the cafe and region. as a beverage it’s native to aus/nz rather than italian coffee culture, but is now pretty common worldwide.

typically a flat white is smaller than a capp which is 8oz, so 6oz would be “textbook”. but I’ve seen them served larger even though I’d argue that it becomes a latte by the time it’s 12oz.

thread about capps is here for reference: https://warpcast.com/matthewb/0x3ccedb3d

Thank you. So, it is weird when American cafes ask which size I would like. I’m always thrown by it because I thought it had to do with ratio of milk to the espresso

well, they’re giving you optionality but really a 12oz flat white is just a latte at that point. so you could argue that a flat white is essentially a small latte (6-8oz vs. 12oz).

the other distinguishing factor is that a flat white is explicitly served with microfoam milk, whereas technically a latte has a small amount of foam on top. but these days nearly all third wave shops make microfoam lattes, so this distinction is moot to some extent.

tldr; the flat white is a very ambiguous drink in terms of its absolute definition but in summary it’s a small latte

And yet you know when you get a perfect one (and I revisit those shops frequently)