Seth Meyers tried coffee milk for the first time. Here's what he thought of the RI drink.

Seth Meyers never heard of coffee milk before George Motz, a chef, author and television personality, came on his show, "Late Night with Seth Meyers" earlier this week.

Motz was on the show to make his famous smash burger that he serves in his New York City diner Hamburger America. But, there was one other item on the menu: coffee milk.

"I've never heard of a coffee milk before," Meyers said, trying to wrap his head around what it was.

"If you're from Rhode Island, it's a specialty of Rhode Island," Motz, who is not from Rhode Island, said by way of explanation. "The coffee milk is very simple. Think of chocolate syrup, but it's coffee syrup instead."

Then he handed Myers his first glass of coffee milk to try.

What did Seth Meyers think of coffee milk?

It was a hit.

"It's really good, dude," Meyers said. "It just tastes like exactly what it is."

George Motz's trick for making coffee milk

When making the coffee milk, Motz had one piece of advice for people whipping coffee milk up at home.

"I teach my kids this all the time. Don't fill up to the top before you put the syrup in," he said, demonstrating my filling the glass about three quarters of the way up.

He then poured in an undisclosed brand of coffee syrup, stirred it, then topped it off with more milk and stirred it again.

Why is coffee milk a Rhode Island thing?

Coffee milk is the Rhode Island state drink. It was invented in Rhode Island sometime in the 1930s.

“The story goes that sometime back in the 1930s a soda jerk at a pharmacy fountain was experimenting with different drinks to offer the kids,” Dave Lanning, the owner of Dave’s Coffee which makes a coffee syrup, said told The Providence Journal previously.

What and Why RI: Why are Rhode Islanders the only ones who are obsessed with coffee milk?

“The kids were getting bored with the typical drinks and wanted to feel like 'grown-ups' that would usually be drinking coffee. He concocted a mixture of strong coffee and a whole bunch of sugar,” he continued. “He mixed this into a tall glass of cold milk and ... coffee milk was born! Word spread quickly, and soon every soda fountain in Rhode Island was offering coffee milk as a special drink to their young customers.”

There are likely layers to this story.

Chef T.J. Delle Donne, the associate dean in the College of Food Innovation & Technology at Johnson & Wales University, told The Providence Journal previously that coffee milk was created by Italian Americans to help stretch their coffee supplies. The grounds from coffee couldn’t be used to make another cup, but they could be used to make syrup for coffee milk.

From there it made it to diners, and then it coffee syrup became a commercial product sold in stores. It was even served with school lunches.

As for why it stuck in Rhode Island, but didn't move beyond the region, it seems that there wasn't a lot of effort to export it.

“In my opinion, it isn't so much that coffee milk didn't catch on as it is that Rhode Islanders hold what's dear to them close to the heart,” Lanning said. “Like clam cakes and Del's, we love our local fare, and it's one of the things that we associate with home. Coffee milk is part of our heritage and is one of the many things that makes our little state special and sets us apart from the others.”

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: Seth Meyers tried RI's coffee milk on his show. Here's what he thought.