Xavier Whitton learned how to make coffee in his mum’s cafe when he was 10 years old. Since then, he’s had a front-row seat to an ever-changing coffee scene. “That was the early noughties, back when a latte would cost you $3,” says Whitton, who now heads front-of-house operations at Tarts Anon.
Whitton’s passion has been a constant, unlike the trends and culture around coffee in Melbourne’s inner suburbs, which change restlessly. From serving styles to the rise of plant milks, coffee is always on the move.
Upside-down lattes and Melbourne magic
Fashion changes affect customers’ coffee orders. While Whitton has seen the classic cappuccino make a comeback lately, one early-aughts classic has quietly slipped away. “The really tall, upside-down latte,” Whitton says. “You’d steam the milk and put that in the cup first, then you’d have the coffee poured over the top and so you have this mountain of foam. You’d see it in Friends.”
Another drink-order trend has its origins here in Melbourne. “Someone asked me for a magic and I actually had to go to another cafe and ask another barista what the fuck a magic was,” he says. “A magic is a double-ristretto, three-quarter-full latte,” he says. “In Sydney it’s a ‘double-ristretto, three-quarter-full latte’. In Melbourne, it’s a ‘magic’.”
Changing beans, blends and roasts
The way the local scene thinks about and uses coffee has also changed. In cafes in Collingwood, Fitzroy or Brunswick you’ll see a passion for coffee quality that gets deep into the specifics of roast levels and coffee origins. “When I was growing up, it was like, Vittoria, Toby’s Estate, maybe Campos, and that’s about it,” Whitton says. “Nowadays, everyone’s got their own single origin from Central and South America, from Africa as well, Papua New Guinea and Indonesia. It’s just so nuanced and every cafe has a different blend.”
The rise of alternative milks
Non-dairy-milk coffee orders are commonplace now. But that wasn’t always the case. “Back in the day, about one in 10 would not be dairy milk. Now it’s almost a 60/40 split to alternatives,” Whitton says. Whitton is lactose intolerant, so he’s paid close attention to the rise of plant-based milks.
There wasn’t much choice in those early cafe days, but now he’s firmly behind oat milk. He says it’s become a coffee staple for the local scene, driven by useability and flavour. “It doesn’t have such a strong flavour that you can’t taste the coffee.”
Whether he’s at Tarts Anon or heading to local “oat dealers” in the inner north – like Archie’s All Day, Kohi No Deshi and Plug Nickel – Whitton’s personal preference for oat milk is set. “For me, it genuinely has to be Oatly,” he says. “It was a decision that we made when we opened up – if it’s not Oatly, it’s not worth it.”
This article is produced by Broadsheet in partnership with Oatly. Dial the 1800-OATFIX hotline to leave a message for your local oat dealer, listen to oats mooing or redeem a code for a free coffee at participating Melbourne cafes from September 16–22. Head to the Oatly website to find out more.
