Aussie coffee entrepreneurs making it in the Big Apple

The first time I visited New York, I was warned about three things: to be constantly aware of personal safety; to forget about Vegemite; and, in the interests of political correctness (and, potentially, personal safety), to never order a flat white. It was 1992 and for 10 days I walked around with my handbag plastered to my body, hyper vigilant for muggers. I ate toasted bagels for breakfast, and tried not to tell myself how much better they'd taste slathered in salty black yeast extract. When I needed a caffeine fix, I deliberately asked for a coffee with milk.

More than 20 years on, I am sitting in a West Village cafe on a crisp winter's morning when an American couple at the next table nonchalantly order a couple of flat whites - to accompany their breakfast of toast with Vegemite and avocado.

Start spreading the brews: Leon Unglik (at right) in Little Collins.Credit: Tim Knox

The change in a few decades is pronounced; time has made the city safer and seemingly better caffeinated. But even more disconcerting than the casual appearance of Vegemite on an American breakfast table is the fact that so many features of this airy cafe are familiar: the distressed decor, the Duralex glasses, even the subtle scent of vinegar-laced boiling water for poaching eggs. Then the heavily tattooed barista, who has "Death before decaf" etched into one of his arms, says "hi" in a distinct Australian accent, and the familiarity makes sense. Outside it might be just a few shades off snowing, but from the inside I could easily be at a cafe in Melbourne.

Australia has produced many successful exports, from plastic banknotes to black box flight recorders. Now our coffee culture, a scene not always entirely obvious at home, has been successfully transplanted to the city that never sleeps. From piccolo lattes to skinny flat whites and a menu of familiar dishes, an initial "expedition" of a handful of Australian cafes opening in Manhattan and Brooklyn has, according to The New York Times, turned into an "invasion" of close to a dozen. Who would have thought that something as commonplace as avocado smash - mashed with a touch of feta, and topped with an optional poached egg - would so successfully fly the flag overseas?

A barista at work in Little Collins. Credit: Tim Knox

"I didn't understand how world class it was until I moved here," says Melburnian Nick Stone of his home town's cafe culture. It was only when he moved to New York in 2010 that he understood its inherent appeal, with its mix of good coffee, food and service.

A former AFL player, Stone had been working in banking when he came to Manhattan to attend a graduate business school. Asked to suggest an idea for a potential business, his proposal was markedly different from the concepts being promoted by the other, mostly older students. "Everyone was pitching app and technology ideas." He came up with a Melbourne-style cafe, with top baristas, good food and affable service.

"You need to resonate with your local cafe in the same way people do in New York with their local bar or dry cleaner," explains Stone, 33. His initial pitch has morphed into a chain of cafes, Bluestone Lane, modelled on "the renowned coffee culture hub of Melbourne, Australia", according to its website, "where premium coffee is a way of life".

Forget boomerangs and tea cosies, though. One of the most obvious signs of the Australianness of these cafes comes not from the decor but the colour of the food. American breakfasts tend to be dominated by shades of beige: omelettes, scrambled eggs, hash browns, waffles, pancakes, french toast. Australian cafe breakfasts might seem comparatively unremarkable at home, but in the cool light of a New York winter's morning they are bursting with vibrancy: brightly coloured micro herbs, orange salmon and, everywhere, the unmistakable green of smashed avocado.

Bean around the block: Bluestone Lane founder Nick Stone. Credit: Tim Knox

"I wanted to start a brand, not a cafe," says Stone, as he tucks into a breakfast of corn fritters at the West Village result of his brainwave, a beach-like cafe with blonde-wood floors and aqua metal chairs that recently hosted a photo shoot for the giant kitchenware company Williams-Sonoma.

Before he opened his first Bluestone Lane in 2013, Stone spent 75 hours observing patrons at 16 Starbucks outlets to see how much time they spent there and what they bought. Now he is at the helm of five of his own establishments around Manhattan; by the end of 2015, that tally will be at least six, maybe seven.

In a city where cafes tend to specialise in either food or coffee, the Aussie interlopers offer high standards of both, freshly made in-house, served by well-trained staff. And in a nation where coffee is overwhelmingly drip-filter and available in milkshake-sized cups, these cafes tend to serve their beverages as they do at home: roughly half the size of the smallest US serve, with disposable cups generally confined to takeaway.

Then there is the challenge of Vegemite. "I sent an email to my staff last week and I said, 'Americans, stop potentially killing people. You are putting on too much Vegemite,' " says Stone's business partner, Aaron Cook, who used to work in occupational therapy in Perth. "It was tongue in cheek but it was saying, 'Get an Australian to show you how to put it on.' People who have a bad experience with Vegemite are not going to come back."

Further north, in a much more commercial area in Midtown, Leon Unglik also understood the importance of convincing customers to embrace Vegemite when he opened his cafe on Lexington Avenue in mid-2013. Now 36, Unglik had been working in debt financing for a leading law firm in Melbourne before he and his wife moved to New York in 2007. On arrival, his priorities were made clear by his first purchase: "Before I had any furniture, I had really good coffee equipment."

He worked for two years in New York as a lawyer. "And I hated it. I kind of knew before I came here I was going to hate it because it was likely to be more intense than back at home, which was already pretty stressful."

But he loved coffee. And when his wife found a job, he left the legal world and started working as a barista, sensing his next career choice probably lay in the world of caffeine - as long as he could cope with the day to day pressures that entailed. "I had done barista courses. I could make great coffee at home. But I had to learn how to make 400 coffees in a morning."

He spent three-and-a-half years working as a barista in the city, making coffee and training other baristas, before opening Little Collins. In a small shop, a short walk from Bloomingdale's, he has created not so much an Australian cafe as a cafe you might find in Australia.

The decor is pared back, with tiny stools at tiny tables piled into a tiny space. A small kitchen sends out freshly made sandwiches of "charcoal chook", or peanut butter with home-made jam (not jelly) and coconut.

The cafe's vibe is warm and welcoming as Unglik presides over a rotating staff of 15, overseeing a customer list that spans local workers and expats. Former prime ministers Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd have popped in, and when Melbourne's mayor, Robert Doyle, was in town recently he brought with him the Little Collins St road sign that now hangs above the counter, the most visible indicator of the cafe's connection to the Antipodes.

Otherwise you will need to look to the menu boards along one wall, where the most popular item on the "brekkie" menu is "the smash" (avocado and feta on toast with chilli flakes and pepitas). Second place goes to "the convict" (toast with Vegemite), a position secured by Unglik in his business's early days when he offered free coffee to anyone prepared to try the Australian spread (expats were specifically excluded from the trial).

Eighteen months on, Unglik is very satisfied with the results - and the redirection of his career. "I don't know whether I would have ever done it in Australia," he says now. "People would have been very surprised and potentially a little judgmental. The move of practising law at quite a prestigious firm, then taking a couple of years to hone my skills as a barista, working in a cafe for the minimum wage - people would have thought I was crazy."

Among New Yorkers, however, his entrepreneurial spirit has been cheerfully embraced - leaving him with job satisfaction he might never have imagined.

"I am still not earning the money that I was earning working as a lawyer over here, but I absolutely love coming to work now," Unglik says with a deep smile as he waves one of his employees goodbye for the day. "There are obviously different sorts of stresses and different challenges. But I have just absolutely loved this experience."