I've got a cafelat robot and occasionally make my wife milk drinks, so I've purchased both the bellman and the nanofoamer.

Is there any difference between the end product of milk each item provides? I see no difference between the steamed milk and the heated up frothed milk.

From my 2+ months of comparing them and learning them, I don't see a difference. The nanofoamer is easy to use, can produce frothed milk within 2 minutes using a microwave, and the cleanup is simple.

The bellman takes a while to heat up and only produces steamed milk as good as the user can produce.

So far I'm leaning towards the Nanofoamer to keep around...one less thing on the stove and quick results are nice.

Are you able to make latte art capable textured milk with either?

Oh god no...my wife and I have fun guessing what I've created though.

I do have slightly better results with the nanofoamer as far as milk consistency. The bellman gives me too much foam.

I'm not sure anything beats a steam wand.. When you are done, the milk is still heating up and the bubbles should be well incorporated and consistent. You need to learn how to get the best out of the bellman and there are a few threads here on it. The bellman can give you much pressure in a short time and so it is easy to get too much air, but it is controllable with practice. The nano former is also good. I have one and have used it with my robot a bit. You can do latte art with either. Although I've done latte art with both, I haven't used either long enough to know the upper end. I suspect the bellman might have a slight edge on quality and will give you a slightly hotter milk when you go to pour it into coffee. Waiting for the bellman overpressure valve to go off can be a bit unnerving.. There is one out now with a pressure gauge.. which is what I'd prefer.

Learning latte art on either might be difficult.. as you can't do a bunch of steams without constantly reheating the bellman, or recharging your batteries.

My 1/2 cent is there is one other item that is quite worthy but its $$$ and that's the Breville Milk Frother.

It has two disks for different textures. Easy to clean, no need to watch it or manage it. Also you can set the temp on it which none of the others can do.

Can be used for other warm milk drinks like hot chocolate.

Can handle volumes for multiple people if ever needed.

We don't often use ours at home but we always take it on the road.

I don't have the Nanofoamer, but a similar looking $10 gizmo that has a double whisk (not like the screens on the nanofoamer). I couldn't get it to produce latte art quality foam, so I also got a vintage electric bellman steamer for very little cost on ebay and found the convenience of heating and frothing at the same time to be a much better experience. The heat-up time for the electric one (550W) is about 4-6 minutes depending on how much water I put in. It's about the same amount of time it takes to boil water + preheat my flair brewhead, so it works out as an excellent poor man's dual boiler setup. It's also just low enough power to not blow my circuit breaker plugged into the same outlet as my kettle.

Nwin23 wrote:Oh god no...my wife and I have fun guessing what I've created though.

I do have slightly better results with the nanofoamer as far as milk consistency. The bellman gives me too much foam.

I just got the nanofomer while visiting family paired with the picopresso. I also have the bellman at home and before I got a proper machine I used it daily for lattes. I was able to get excellent texture from the bellman but it took a while to heat up and it took some learning (at first it was too much foam) right now, a week into the nanofomer and I'm not liking the results. It's ok but not great and I really can't get a decent texture for latte art. I thought it would be easier but I'll have to look over some videos to pick up on some tips. I know Lance Hendriks promotes it and he knows a thing or two about milk texturing so I blame my technique. I dislike that you have to hold the power switch rather than click it and it stays on. But the lattes taste good which is better than the in-laws keurig.

I've actually started with the Nanofoamer and ended up getting a Bellman steamer. The Nanofoamer works in a pinch and I used it for over 6 months as primary milk foaming took after getting a lever machine. It did a decent job, but I'm the last month I couldn't get it to foam up the oat milk I've been buying no matter what. It just made a flat mess. Not sure if milk changed or if I was doing something wrong, but nothing worked. I gave up and ordered a Bellman and couldn't be happier. It takes some getting used to, but now I can make awesome foam and fast. No more messing with a microwave. The same oat milk that was giving my Nanofoamer issues, was working great with the Bellman. I was getting too much foam, but finally get the routine down and love it. I preheat it with the espresso machine and everything is ready to go at the same time. Wish I got it sooner.

One hack, I have a glass top electric, so got one of those induction plates to go between the glass and the bellman, and now the heat is not radiating as much while steaming. So a lot more comfortable all around. Works without it, no real speed improvement in heating, but it makes it a lot more pleased to use.

I remember reading something along the lines that cold milk foams better than hot, perhaps related to how protein breaks down at higher temperatures.

Bellman is the best/easiest steamer that I've used. Good pressure, pretty dry steam and lots of control. I did end up selling mine because it felt nervous about safety and it was slow (~15 minutes using pre-boiled water) to heat up on a regular electric stove but the results were solid.

I'm sure there's a limit with the heat of milk and the ideal goal temp is about 60-70°C. In my experience you need cold milk with a steam wand because the wand aerates and heats at the same time and if you hit your goal temp too early your texture may not be developed as much as you want it to be so starting cold gives you time to texture the milk. This would be true with the bellman but not with the nanofoamer since the nanofoamer only textures the milk but doesn't heat it.