Saturday, August 20, 2005


hissing foam collapse, solved

i bought a new container of that skim+ milk because it foams so nicely. so i texture as usual with silvia, all nice and no problem.

then after i made mr. right his usual morning latte with jessica's fresh batdorf dancing goat, and sprinkled it with sugar (he loves the way a thin layer of sugar melts on top of the microfoam to make a little crust) as usual, everything seemed all normal.

he went to get the newspaper, came back into the room and suddenly we hear this hissing. where is it coming from? the latte!

the foam's hissin' like an enraged madagascar cockroach and before our eyes begins to collapse into itself with a rolling motion like niagara falls.

in about a minute it was all over. the foam had completely disappeared and you could hardly tell there had ever been any milk in the coffee at all.

truly a case for the european milk-foam guru morten munchow (and here if you read danish), no? but long-time bccy pal, scaa pro, roasters' guild hero, and certified barista judge barry jarrett of riley's had the answer: the milk's on its way out, probably due to poor handling by the grocery store in the unusually hot weather we've been having here in nyc.

as he says: "things can happen in milk which don't affect taste but do affect frothability.  the milk can be 'in date' but still have gone off as far as frothing is concerned."

new carton of milk for me then!

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