I am looking for a milk frother. I am thinking about the Bellman stovetop milk steamer or the Breville electric milk frother. Anybody with experience with those or any other suggestion?

Martin,

I have been using a Bellman stove top steamer for several years and am completely happy with it for our mobile and camp cappuccino duties (sometimes atop my Jetfoil stove). Typically, once it has been heat soaked and steaming, I can get perfect latte art style micro-foam very, very easily. My unit only has a 1-hole tip and given its small water capacity/surface area I don't try to steam more than 8-ounces or so of milk at a time; however that is all I need for our morning ritual .

Thank you Dan.
I am also in the impression that a milk steamer is better than an electric milk frother.

That depends on what you want to make. I bought a Nespresso Aeroccino Plus a few years ago to try in my office. It makes very thick and tasty foam - but it's so thick that all you can do with it is pour or spoon it into your coffee. There's a heating element, so the foam's warm too. But if you want to pour art (or if you just want a true microfoam), you'll have to steam your milk. I don't use the device because it doesn't do what I want.

spressomon wrote:Martin,

I have been using a Bellman stove top steamer for several years and am completely happy with it for our mobile and camp cappuccino duties (sometimes atop my Jetfoil stove). Typically, once it has been heat soaked and steaming, I can get perfect latte art style micro-foam very, very easily. My unit only has a 1-hole tip and given its small water capacity/surface area I don't try to steam more than 8-ounces or so of milk at a time; however that is all I need for our morning ritual .

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I gotta ask you what your technique is, because I have a Bellman also and have been struggling a bit to get decent microfoam. Sometimes I get decent microfoam on the top half inch of milk, but thin milk underneath that no amount of swirling will incorporate. Other times I get no stretching and just thin milk or too stiff of foam.

The first steaming, more often than not, results in larger bubble foam. Not sure why but I've used my Bellman extensively and more than 1/2 the time that is the result. But after that its pure microfoam. I typically use whole milk...

When I get back home next week I'll make a little video to post up here.

Skip them all.

Glass pitcher. Microwave. 6oz milk. 115 seconds. $3 battery operated whisk. 20 seconds. boom.

spressomon wrote:The first steaming, more often than not, results in larger bubble foam. Not sure why but I've used my Bellman extensively and more than 1/2 the time that is the result. But after that its pure microfoam. I typically use whole milk...

When I get back home next week I'll make a little video to post up here.

I usually use 2%, but had tried a carton of whole milk to see. I was pretty sad when my whole milk turned out the same or worse than some of my 2% attempts. I would appreciate that video immensely, it would help a lot. Between multiple tries of slow and steady steam, to nearly full blast, I am getting no sort of consistency in results.

I don't steam for cappuccino's but use a Graef frother, works pretty well. The resulting warm milk has a nice rich texture and good consistency and could probably be used for latte art if I was able to or gave a d*^%+ (just can't be bothered).
The type of milk and brand does make a huge difference though, somehow one brand of organic whole miilk works best.

spressomon wrote:The first steaming, more often than not, results in larger bubble foam.

Like any machine without vacuum breaker valve, you need to purge this too. Even some machines with vac valve will still need a little purge to get rid of the air. I noticed a similar effect on my electric steamer that the first few second tends to be blowing out air rather than steam into my milk.