Hey friends, today I want to talk about something that has been on my mind for a little while now: coffee. Actually, coffee of the iced variety.
I’ve said a few times now that I’m not a huge coffee person. This is still true. I don’t really notice the difference in the taste of beans from various countries, nor do I notice the way they’ve been roasted/ground/pressed/whathaveyou. While coffee snob fanatic friends of mine can wax poetic about the notes of “caramel, hazelnuts, chocolate, or smokey BBQ (??)” they can taste, I might say “gee, this sure tastes like coffee”. Or, “what is this? Motor oil?” in the case of espresso, which here they also call short blacks. Very literal with their words, those Aussies.
I have however grown to like it in some of the milkier varieties (I’m looking at you, flat white) since I’ve moved here as I’ve been drinking them so often these days! There is one coffee drink that has been intriguing me until recently though. Oddly enough, it’s nothing fancy (like that cat poop coffee that people still talk about sometimes), but instead your regular iced coffee. Which, by the way, one would assume is just cold coffee over ice, maybe with a little milk or cream. Right?
WRONG!
I know what you’re thinking: Hey, there’s ice cream in there! Did you order a milkshake by mistake? Or, maybe they couldn’t understand you with that Canadian accent, EH? Or, oooooh, yummy!
As a matter of fact, yes, the drink pictured above was incredibly tasty. And I thought I’d made a mistake too when it happened to me the first time. The other two times, not so much.
#1: Oops, my bad. Or was it?
The first time it happened I thought I’d accidentally ordered an affogato. I was in a noisy cafe in Melbourne and asked the barista for an “iced coffee”, while pointing at the menu on the wall because I thought she might not hear me. I only noticed that “affogato” was listed right below it after she came back with a scoop of ice cream in my drink. Maybe they served affogatos like milkshakes here in OZ?
#2: No cream = ice cream?
The second time it happened I was sitting down in a little cafe in the Sydney ‘burb of Glebe. I had been exploring the area and checking out apartments. Very cool place, but very quiet (probably because it was still early in the morning on a Saturday), so no one can say I didn’t order an “iced coffee”. My server even asked if I wanted cream in it, to which I said no thanks. This drink came with ice cream. The only conclusion I had was that “no cream” means “ice cream”. Or that maybe she wasn’t asking if I wanted cream but instead stating that there was none, in which case they had to use ice cream as a replacement?? Things were definitely getting weird. Tasty, but weird.
Note: I guess at this point I could have just Googled “Australian iced coffee” to get the scoop (pun TOTALLY intended) on all these scoops ending up in my coffees. But I thought it would be fun to take another stab at it in another coffee shop. On to attempt number three.
#3: Third time’s a charm… a delicious ice cream-filled charm
My third attempt found me at the cafe across the street where my new friend Mr. Owner happened to be behind the counter. When I walked up he asked, “flat white?” like he always does, but this time I said I wanted to try an iced coffee. When he laughed and said, “never too early for ice cream, is it?” (it was around 9 o’clock in the morning), that’s when the lightbulb went off. I decided to stick with the flat white.
As I’ve since learned, in Australia the “iced” in iced coffee means ice cream. More specifically espresso, milk or cream, sometimes a sugary syrup (mmm sugary syrup), and that damn scoop of ice cream. And maybe a coffee bean or two for garnish if you’re lucky. Think of it as a DIY milkshake, except you don’t bother with a blender.
Go figure the next time I ordered an iced coffee with a friend — and the full intention of sharing the ice cream — I got a cup full of ice with cold coffee in it. Ha.
TL;DR:
Just because something has the same name in one country doesn’t make it the same thing somewhere else. Iced coffee, as I’ve discovered, is one of those things. For now I will blame this on my coffee-ignorance. Has this ever happened to you while living or traveling abroad? Please share your stories so I don’t feel so silly. 🙂
-C
Image credit (header): Jeremy Brooks / CC
