Latte Art mod
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 due to the condition required of the espresso shot and milk. Producing a good cup of coffee depends on the experience of the barista and the overall quality of the espresso machine. But for latte artists, skill depends purely on the amount of experience and practice he/she has had without the aid of an espresso machine. This is considered a challenge for latte artists because the skill involved in making creative latte art isn’t aided by fancy CAD or other technology which, say a product designer would commonly use for their work. 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.
The amount of skill and multitasking which a barista must attain is a lot higher than you would first think. As discussed earlier a barista already has to know the delicate art form of creating a wide range of coffees, including the difficult task of foaming milk into the perfect consistency then pouring it into the cup without ruining the coffee. The barista must carry out this delicate procedure often while under pressure from incoming orders, which I’d imaging is a skill not easily attained. Unfortunately baristas are generally underpaid for their work which is disappointment considering the amount of time and skill they put into every cup of coffee.
Baristas have turned an everyday drink into a malleable art form. What helped latte art gain attention and popularity were it’s drinkers, but specifically coffee lovers. Many people drink coffee religiously and the introduction of latte art would probably have boosted their appreciation for drinking their morning latte. With the addition of funky patterns on their coffee, the drinker can appreciate the creativity and time which was put into making the art. The latte art presents a new level of aesthetic presentation to the humble cup of coffee, by adding personality through the use of colours, patterns and smell.
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 which have to be considered. Always start with cold milk and pitcher. Put the milk into steam pitcher. Place the steam wand into 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 counter-clockwise. 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. The unique thing about creating latte art is the soft layer of foam acts as a canvas. Over the years artists have always created their work with sculpting material or painted on canvas or other sorts of flat surfaces. The unstable surface of coffee opens a completely new realm of potential techniques, because the artists ‘canvas’ can be moulded into what he/she is designing. Two of these techniques, free pouring and etching are explained in further detail in the following paragraph.
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, free pouring and etching. Both techniques are self explanatory, free pouring creates a pattern while you pour and etching uses a slim, pointy tool such as a toothpick to create patterns after you pour. Most of the latte art that has been presented to you so far are free pouring, but a drawback of this is it requires more time to prepare the drink. Many etched latte art uses caramelised sugar, cinnamon or chocolate sauce to help create shapes and patterns. A simple etching technique is pouring two or more circles of chocolate sauce, and lightly drag a toothpick from the centre to the outer rim of the cup. For added effect alternate between from centre to outside and outside to centre. A lot of the time baristas combine the two techniques to create elaborate art. The picture below is an example.
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, this art form has evolved from abstract patterns and shapes to cartoonish images of animals, and right to elaborate portraits of people.
Techniques
Latte art is difficult to master 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 use the movement of the arm to create the pattern. There are few more ways to create latte art. The technique called etching is an alternative if the barista desires to make latte art with more detail. The difference 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. The technique of free pouring is often quicker to execute than etching. Like the name suggests, free pouring relies on a few factors, as discussed before the movement of the arm pouring the foam and which the rate of the foam is entering the cup. The majority of the art is created in one delicate move and if the barista wants to, they can make fine details with toothpicks or even incorporate etching into the free poured coffee. Here’s a simple method of making free pouring latte art.
1. Pour enough milk for one cup into the steam pitcher.
2. Put the steam wand at the bottom of the pitcher. Turn on the steam, and slowly raise the wand until it is near the top of the milk. Lower the pitcher as the milk rises so the steam wand stays 1 cm away from the top of the milk. The milk should not stretch too much nor should there be any big bubbles. This should create a smooth, velvety milk.
3. Allow the milk to reach 27 ºC. Place the steam wand on the side of the pitcher, deep into the milk, positioning the pitcher to spin counter-clockwise. Keep doing this motion until the milk heats to 65 ºC - 70 ºC.
4. Shut the steam and remove the steam wand and thermometer from the milk.
5. Let the milk settle for a few seconds. This will allow a more velvety texture.
6. Swirl the milk vigorously. If you see any bubbles, pound the pitcher on the counter several times to remove visible bubbles and go back to swirling the milk for 20 to 30 seconds.
7. Start pouring the milk into the espresso. To create a flower pattern pour the milk between 2 cm and 3 cm away from the bottom. Once the cup is about half filled, gently shake the pitcher back and forth while slowly moving it backwards. The flower design will move forward, filling the cup. Do this with a shaking motion originating at the wrist instead of moving your hand back and forth. This step will probably be the most challenging so remember practice is the key!
8. Continue until the foam reaches the top of the cup. Then, sweep the rest of the milk up the centre of the newly created pattern. Use a minimal amount to avoid sinking the pattern.
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. YouTube can possibly be used as another online forum for the exchange of information. People can post videos of their favourite coffees or even show step-by-step instructions on how to make it. 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. As latte art became a worldwide phenomenon competitions became more and more popular with cash prizes increasing in amount. Today it wouldn’t be surprising to find a first prize up to and exceeding $500.
Facebook
Coffeegeek
Australia Latte art champion Will Priestly
Evaluation
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
One drawback of the printing technique is it generally takes a while to print any sort of image, elaborate or simple. So when the customer receives their coffee it will most likely be lukewarm, not to mention that pictures made by printing are incredibly elaborate so people wouldn’t want to ruin it or even pay extra for something that will taste the same without the fancy art. With that said the Latte Art Printing Machine would unlikely be used in a café environment as it takes away the fun in making the art. From my perspective the machine is more of a fun prototyping machine which mixes an art form that purely uses the skill of human hands and arms, and technology we see in CNC, 3D printing and laser cutting. The end result is kind of pointless but fascinating at the same time.
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)
