The Sun-Herald

WHO WE ARE: A nation of capppuholics

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A column about Australia by David Dale, published in The Sun-Herald, 15/11/2009
LET THE Germans celebrate their falling wall. Australia has a far more significant social shift to commemorate this year - the 30th anniversary of our change from a nation of tea drinkers to a nation of coffee drinkers, which means from passive to active, from apathetic to engaged, from relaxed and comfortable to alert but not alarmed, from an island off the coast of England to an island in the middle of the Mediterranean, from the kind of place where a John Howard would grow up and lead the Liberal Party to a place that would spawn a Kevin Rudd.

Yes, 1979 was the year when coffee consumption on the way up passed tea consumption on the way down. To mark the moment, the baristas of our nation have this year added a new permutation to their repertoire - the piccolo (an espresso with a bit more milk than a macchiato and a bit less milk than a latte).

This brings the number of shapes in which you can order your pickmeup in the typical suburban cafe to a glorious 16.

My caffeine, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways: espresso (or short black), double espresso, long black, macchiato, large macchiato, piccolo, latte (hot milk, minimum froth), flat white (a latte but served in a cup instead of a glass), cappuccino (hot milk, lots of froth), affogato (espresso with a dollop of icecream).

That's your basic array. Now add skim milk versions, soy milk versions, decaffeinated versions, and the babycino, and you see why baristas have to do so much fiddling with their machines that they'd have no time to boil water if some eccentric came in and asked for a cup of tea.

Lets track the transformation. In 1949, every Australian drank 3.2 litres of tea a year and 0.2 litres of coffee.

In the early 1950s, the cappuccino machine arrived, along with mass immigration from Italy. (As far as I can establish, the first one was installed in 1953 at the University Cafe in Lygon Street, Melbourne, pictured above). And thus coffee's conquest of the suburbs began.

By 1979, we were consuming 1.7 litres of tea and 1.7 litres of coffee a year. Nowadays, tea is below 0.8 litres and coffee is past 4 litres per person a year.

Put another way, in 50 years each of us has gone from two cups of tea a week to three cups of coffee a week. The research agency Bis Shrapnel estimates that outside the home, Australians drink a billion coffees a year, of which 480 million are cappuccinos.

But 80 per cent of our coffee consumption is home-made instant (we spend $250 million a year in supermarkets on Nescafe Blend 43, and $150 million on Moccona).

So the nation swallows five billion cups of coffee a year. No wonder we elected a prime minister who operates on five hours sleep a night and expects his public servants to work 15 hours a day. Give them all another double short skim piccolo.

Go to Comments to discuss the national addiction.

David Dale is the author of The Little Book of Australia -- A snapshot of who we are (Allen and Unwin). For daily updates on Australian attitudes, bookmark blogs.sunherald.com.au/whoweare.