Latte Art
From Mod Mania
Have you ever heard of “Fancy Art Pours”? You might think, “ What’s that?” Well I’m pretty sure coffee lovers know that and baristas (Italian for ‘bartender”) too, and they have mastered this technique very well.
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So what’s fancy art pour?
Fancy art pour also known as café latte or Latte art. It’s a style of art, pouring steamed milk into a shot of espresso and creates pattern on the surface of the latte. It’s a difficult technique to be mastered and also due to the condition required of the espresso shot and milk. To produce a good coffee is depends on the experience of the barista and also the quality of the espresso machine. But for the latte art, it depends on the skill of the latte artist, which is really challenging for them.
For the past few years, the amount of baristas has risen and this becomes a competitive phenomenon. Baristas started to learn how to combine the perfect espresso with the nice presentation of the latte art to attract more customers and increases business.
Culture
Where did latte art come from? Based on my research, the first espresso machine was founded by an Italian company called Luigi Bezzera. Since then espresso has become the icon of Italy. It would be hard to think of Italy without coffee. I believe that Italian is the one who combine the art into the coffee culture. However, latte art developed differently in different countries, following the introduction of espresso and the development of microfoam.
During 1980s and 1990s, latte art wad developed and popularized by David Schomer in USA. He is considered a guru by his successful in innovations and breakthrough in the latte art journal and instructional books and video. He had developed the rosette pattern in 1992 inspired by a photograph he saw from Café Mateki in Italy. Since then, the rosette pattern has become one of the most easily recognize in latte art.
Luigi Bezzera coffee machine
David Schomer Latte Art Guru
Is time to try
To make a latte art, there are few points that have to be concerned. Always start with cold milk and cold pitcher. Put the milk into steam pitcher. Place the steam wand to the pitcher and turn on the steam. The milk rises slowly and maintains the position of the wand. The milk can’t be stretch too much and should be bubble free.
Place the steam wand side of the pitcher, and spin counterclockwise. Keep doing this until the milk temperature until 70 degrees. Turn the steam off the remove pitcher from the wand. If you see any bubbles, tap the pitcher on the counter to remove the bubble and then you start swirling the milk. Now you can start pouring the milk into the espresso to create the pattern you want.
making Latte art
Here’s the link to watch the latte art tutorial.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24Q4LuEmbvs
Styles
Basically, there are two types of latte art, which are free pouring and etching. Free pouring is creates pattern while you pouring and etching is using a tool to create pattern after you pour. Most of the latte art we saw are free pouring however it requires more time to prepare the drink.
The most common shape of free pouring techniques is heart shape and ‘rosette’ shape. “Rosette’ shape is the fern which is a type of flower. Heart shape is one of the first latte art to become popular. Even though it’s simple yet it’s still very common nowadays.
When the latte art become common and popular in 90s, baristas were asked to create some complicated shapes and patterns. Here are some images of the latte art. As you can see from the images, the patterns are no longer simple heart shape but some animals face or some funny expression.
Techniques
Latte art is difficult to mastered because there are many element to create a nice and impressive latte art. Barista has to practice more to be able to get along with quality of coffee, correct temperature and the textures of the milk.
Free pouring techniques only uses the movement of the arm to create the pattern. There are few more ways to create latte art. There’s a technique called etching. The different between etching and free pouring is etching requires a stirrer to create defined edges and patterns. Some baristas use chocolate or caramel syrup to write message on top.
etching
Competition . Online Forum
Online forum is one of the fastest way to keep yourself updated no matter gadgets, fashion, vehicle and of course Latte art. ‘Coffeegeek.com’ is the online forum to gather the coffee lover from the entire world. They can exchange their information, sharing the experiences, the images. Besides that, Facebook is the other ‘new’ way to communicate. The member sharing their work by posting up the picture and give comments.
Competition has been held to demonstrate their skill and find out who’s the best. There’s one Latte art competition was held early this year in St.Ali café. This competition had gathered some best baristas in Melbourne and it judged by Australian Latte art champion, Will Priestly.
Facebook
Coffeegeek
Australia Latte art champion Will Priestly
Evolution
From these images, we can see that nothing is impossible, its just need more practices to create the impressive patterns. However, there is a barista who named Oleksiy Pikalo. He is the founder of the Latte art-printing machine. He had made his first printing machine in 2007 and published a video to Internet. He had gained some fame and started a company called OnLatte in Boston, Usa.
So how it works?
Basically the “ink’ is caramelized sugar. What you need to do just like normal printer. Find the image you like and connect to the Latte Printer. Place the cup beside the printer and it will just start printing.
Here’s the video shows how it works.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PjgVeJkdBn0&feature=player_embedded
With rise in popularity of latte art, there are many baristas actually focused too much on the Latte art but neglect about the quality of the coffee. However, is good to see some new invention especially the Latte Art Printing Machine. It is a big achievement for Latte Art and also to Industrial design industry. Latte art might be inconspicuous in our life, but for baristas, they will continue evolve their style and continue living with the enjoyment of Latte art.
Reference:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barista (viewed 21/8/2010)
http://www.ineedcoffee.com/02/latteart/ (viewed 21/8/2010)
http://weburbanist.com/2010/04/15/designer-baristas-50-incredible-works of Latte Art | Design + Ideas (viewed 21/8/2010)
http://www.world-latteart-championship.com/competition.php(viewed 21/8/2010)
http://themsg.wordpress.com/2010/02/20/coffee-culture/(viewed 21/8/2010)
