Hello. I'm fairly new to everything coffee and I wanted to see if anyone had any recommendations for something I could do differently. I use a Krups at home espresso machine (I can barely refer to this as a machine. It's pretty bad but it gets the job done!) I have done my research on pulling the perfect shot and just about everything I need to know for this. The main thing with this machine is you must extract the espresso and steam the milk separately. You must put the amount of water you need for the shot of espresso in separately. It needs to be the perfect amount. I usually use about 2oz of water for the shot. I originally used two tablespoons of espresso for extraction and then decreased it to a tablespoon and a half to make the coffee last longer. I've been told I have good milk texture and at first I was getting fairly good results like these.







Then when I decreased the amount of coffee to a scoop and a half, the results weren't near as good. I noticed the milk would not glide across the surface and it would not spread at all. I ended up getting results like these.







I know it sounds like I just diagnosed my issue, but I was wondering if anyone had any different input. And I know I'm working with garbage equipment and coffee, but it's worked several times before. I use illy ground espresso as well.

First of all, my gut reaction was to send some expletives in your direction for achieving these results with *that* equipment. I'm *far* from these with a Pro 700 so I'm pretty jealous right now.

Anyway I have the same general problem, but I doubt the same solution applies. In my case, crema seems too thick to let the pattern evolve over the surface (milk texture seems alright to me). Things that have helped:

• I realized I was over-extracting. Lowering the temperature produced more well-behaved crema.
• I'm trying patterns with 5 oz cortados (or are they flat whites?), with double (close to 60mL/2oz) shots. Most videos seem to use single shots; perhaps reducing the dose or coffee volume would help in my case.
• Pausing the pour and mixing the milk and coffee half-way in helps tremendously in my case.

More importantly IMO, how does it taste? When I nail milk temp perfectly, it's super sweet. When I hit the right texture, it's like heavy whipping cream.

I'm also very impressed that you're able to achieve those results (even just visually) on a Krups with Illy pre-ground. My guess as to what's happening might be related to the Illy coffee, as it starts out near like fresh coffee when the tin is opened, but rapidly stales in my experience.

The good news is that with each upgrade of equipment, you'll likely see improved results, but likely more in taste rather than visual appeal. Your latte art is way better than mine on any of those drinks shown.