Creating latte art at home
When the Food to Love team set out to learn more about creating latte art, it was a no-brainer to skip across the road from our offices to the headquarters of The Barista Academy. This is where trained baristas teach newbies basic and more advanced coffee skills and techniques – including latte art!
We met with Nic Berry, The Barista Academy founder and head of training, and Cody Cao, a professional barista, to get some tips and tricks for creating latte art at home.
Nic’s tips and tricks for the perfect milk to create latte art
Make sure your milk texture is spot-on. Without good milk texture it’s really hard to create latte art.
Make sure you have enough milk in your jug. If you don’t have enough milk the steam pressure will splatter it around and you’ll get unwanted uneven aeration. Fill the jug halfway with cold milk, or until it reaches the base of the spout when you put the jug under the spout.
You need to add air and texture to the milk. Aerate and texturise the milk until it’s at the correct temperature (55-60 degrees) – go for a silky smooth texture that is quite runny. The milk needs to flow across the surface of the coffee.
Creating the base for great latte art is all about swirling the milk and espresso.
Working the milk and jug
Create the base first by pouring and swirling the milk into the espresso.
Bring the jug down in close proximity to the cup and push the milk across the surface. At the end lift the jug high and cut through for defined latte art.
For the white layered effect, get the jug down close to the surface, if you have any height you’re going to make the milk sink and lose definition. If your jug is close to the coffee, it will flow out across the surface and creates layers – that’s going to give you the ability to push the milk and make shapes.
Creating a basic rosetta
A double shot espresso will give you more colour to work with but there will be more liquid to punch through… so it’s all relative! It’s up to you what kind of an espresso hit you want.
Swirling the espresso interrupts the crema so the milk can penetrate it more easily.
Rosettas are all individual depending on how fast your move your jug. A rosetta is like a signature so there isn’t a bad one.
If you want less of a drag line, lift your jug higher.
Nic and Cody sample their creations outside their offices.
Extra tips and tricks
Educate your palette so you know what you’re serving and what it tastes like and what it should taste like, says Nic. “It’s important to drink coffee that’s not right so you know the experience when someone gets a coffee that’s not made correctly.”
Dishwashing liquid foams just like milk does. If you want to practice without using all of your milk, you can add a drop of dishwashing liquid to water and practice in exactly the same way.
You should be able to get eight or nine pours out of jug to practice different techniques. “The best thing is to do it quite mindlessly,” says Nic. “Don’t focus too much on the end result. To get to that level you need a bit of experience so just practice as much as you can.”
Try swapping hands and get those motor skills going. You brain will get a bit of balance and after three or four tries things start to fall into place.
Thanks to The Barista Academy.
