Hi there,

This is my first posting and also a 2 month old home barista. My question regarding latte art is this:

- During the initial pouring, the milk is raised to height. Can I say that the pouring speed is "normal"?
- When you are ready for latte art and drops down the pitcher to near the milk to pour say just a simple heart. Is the speed of the pour the same as before (of course, now you are now pouring closer to the milk) OR do you increase or decrease pour speed when you do latte art?

Thanks for any advise
Kelvin Wong

Welcome Kelvin,

Since the speed of the initial pour has a little bit of flexibility (and we don't know how fast you are doing it), it might not be very helpful to use it as a basis for the speed of the second or "art" part of the pour. I found it helpful to watch latte art videos to get a good idea of speed and technique. For me, the successful pour was slower than I thought and I needed to get much closer to the surface on the art part of the pour.

I have a new thicker pitcher and steam toy (a steam "espresso" maker) that I will be using at work just for steaming milk. The first time I used the combo, the results seemed underdone. Instead of fixing it, I went ahead and poured. Surprisingly, the definition and beauty of the milk was much better than my usual. Watching the latte videos, I noticed that I have been spending a little too much time stretching (aerating) the milk. I think the name "foaming" the milk had subconsciously lead me to do this. I was always aware that the milk was supposed to resemble thick paint, but the surface of what I had been doing looked like a slightly foamy thick paint. It was sort of okay for art, but distinct larger rosettas weren't happening. I had locked into obtaining a certain temperature feel on the outside of the pitcher while stretching.

As a side note to those interested, the steam toy (Mr. Coffee) does a surprisingly excellent job of steaming the milk to the right consistency with the large wand cover removed and Teflon tape added to seal the threads under the tip. However, the machine and lid needed multiple rinsings (and shaking) with water, then lemon juice, more water, then a citric acid solution, and more water, etc., including several brew cycles to reduce the plastic smell and leave the steam condensation tasteless so I could actually use it.

Thanks very much to the reply, I did look at lots and lots of videos, but it is very hard to notice if the speed increased or decreased during the actual latte art pour.

A few things I do know is that the slower you pour the more milk will come out instead of foam. The faster you pour the more foam will come out.

For example, for a cappuccino pour, one has to pour aggressive to pour out all the form from the pitcher, any slower, it becomes either a latte or a la-cap (btw latte and cappuucino) lolz.

So my question I guess is based on the initial pour speed, whether fast or slow. So taking reference from the initial pour speed, does one speed up or slow down the pour when bringing pitcher mouth down and starting the latte art pour?

You can try faster and slower to see for yourself, but your initial question and response leads me to think it's just not working for you regardless. You might have a problem with your micro foam. It sounds too aerated to me.

Yes, consistency of milk foam is what most of us struggle with! lolz. So I discount times when my foaming is bad. Here are some of the latte art I could get. The problem is obviously, its not very define and nor very nice nor professional and also I couldn't consistently get them, which is why I am asking the experts about how they would pour.