Starbucks Flat White

The Starbucks Flat White costs £4.60 and carries 76 calories in the 8oz cup it is served in, which is the size the drink was built around rather than a small version of something larger. Two ristretto shots go in and steamed milk goes over them with barely any foam, so the finished drink sits flat to the rim. The name is literal.

Ristretto is where the flavour difference starts. A shot cut short leaves out the thin, bitter tail that comes at the end of a normal pour, so what reaches the cup is the sweeter front of the extraction: cocoa, caramel, a little dried fruit. Less milk sits on top of that than in any other Starbucks milk drink apart from the cortado, so the coffee is the loudest thing in the cup. The texture is smooth and heavy rather than airy, closer to single cream than to the foam of a cappuccino.

Caffeine is 89.1mg from those two shots, the same figure as a Grande Caffè Latte, but it arrives in roughly half the liquid. That is the reason people order it: the same coffee, less to drink. Starbucks UK publishes nutrition for the 8oz serving only, so the calorie figure above is for that cup rather than a range across sizes. At 76 calories it is the lightest milk drink on the hot menu, and a Grande Caffè Latte carries nearly double.

The milk matters more here than in any other drink on the menu. With so little of it and no foam layer to hide behind, a badly steamed jug shows up immediately as bubbles on the surface. A good one pours flat and holds a mirror finish to the rim. Whole milk is the default in UK stores because the fat carries that shine, and asking for semi skimmed thins both the body and the look.

It suits anyone who finds a latte too milky and an americano too thin, which covers most of the mid morning trade. Order it in and it comes in a ceramic cup rather than paper, which keeps the heat steady for the four or five minutes the drink is worth drinking. The Cortado takes the same idea further with even less milk in a 6oz cup, and the Cappuccino goes the opposite way with a deep foam cap over a bigger pour.