The art of coffee flower drawing

In fact, there has never been a very clear literature on the origin of the coffee flower, only that at that time in Europe and the United States, the coffee flower was the difficult professional technology displayed during the coffee performance, and such innovative skills and the difficult technology showed greatly shocked the coffee industry at that time and attracted public attention from the very beginning. All people are deeply attracted by the magical and gorgeous skills of coffee flower drawing.

At that time, most of the coffee flowers paid attention to the presentation of patterns, but after a long period of development and evolution, coffee flowers were not only visually particular, but also the ways and techniques of milk taste and integration have been constantly improved. and then in the overall taste of the presentation, to achieve the so-called color, aroma, taste state.

In Europe and the United States and Japan, there are many professional coffee books, all introducing the basic technology of "Latte Art", and many coffee-related books, which take coffee flower as the professional symbol of the cover, and coffee flower has become a necessary professional technology in all kinds of competitions.

Every year, the "The Millrock Latte art Competition" World Coffee pull Competition is held in "coffee fest" in the United States, bringing together coffee pull experts from all over the world to show a variety of innovative patterns and skilled skills in the competition. In the "world barista competition" (WBC) World Coffee draw Competition, which is known as the Olympic competition in the coffee industry, coffee pull is a necessary professional coffee technology for athletes. Each representative of each country will show their superb skills in the cappuccino event during the competition, which shows the importance and professionalism of coffee pull in the Italian coffee industry.

Prepare Espresso coffee: since the Latte coffee we use to make flowers is made from Espresso, it is also necessary to extract the correct Espresso. After all, this is a cup of coffee to be imported rather than a work of art, and we still have to ensure the quality of its entrance. In this way, more than 10 cups of failed flowers will not be wasted in the process of doing exercises. After all, the quality of flowers will not affect the taste of coffee. If you want to make a pure Espresso, you must use a pump coffee machine.

Do not use skim milk as the fat content in skim milk is too low, so the taste of the foam will be much worse than the full-fat steam foam machine or manual milk bubble pot: what is milk foam? Milk foam is the product of a fine mixture of milk and air. The way to make milk foam is to pump air into the milk. The principle is simple, but it is not a simple thing to make a cup of dense and meticulous foam. The most common problem is that too much air enters the milk, producing too thick hard foam, which floats on the surface and cannot be fully mixed with coffee, so you can't enjoy the fine texture of foam and coffee when you drink it. It is recommended that you use a steam foam machine to make milk bubbles, which will make the process easier. Fortunately, many pump coffee machines now have this function built in, such as Delon BAR14 (single pump, which needs to make coffee and milk foam first), Delon EAM4000 (double pump, which can make coffee and milk foam at the same time) pointed mouth flower cup (beating milk jar): this thing is the most easily overlooked, although he is inconspicuous, but the effect is not small. First of all, the temperature requirements of milk bubbles are relatively high, only at 60-80 degrees will produce good quality milk bubbles, so you can feel the temperature of milk through the stainless steel milk tank.

The production of milk bubbles:

Method 1: use a milk bubble pot to make handmade milk foam

1. Pour the milk into the milk bubble pot, and the amount should not exceed 1 / 2 of the milk bubble pot, otherwise the milk will spill over due to expansion when making the milk bubble.

2. Heat the milk to about 60 degrees, but not more than 70 degrees, otherwise the protein structure in the milk will be destroyed. Be careful! The lid and strainer cannot be heated directly. (for example, make ice foam to cool the milk below 5 degrees Celsius, of course, do not overfreeze and let the milk freeze.)

3, cover the lid and the filter, quickly twitch the filter to press the air into the milk, there is no need to press to the end, because it is to pump the air into the milk, so as to act on the surface of the milk; the number of times is not too much, gently twitch about 30 times.

4. Remove the lid and strainer and scrape off the thick foam with a spoon, leaving dense hot (ice) foam.

Method 2: use Italian coffee machine steam to control milk foam

1. Do not put the steam pipe into the milk, because there may be some condensed water in the steam pipe, so let off some steam in the front section and drain the excess water by the way.

two。 Insert the thermometer into the milk container, then insert the steam pipe obliquely into the milk and turn on the steam switch.

3. Slowly adjust the position of the steam nozzle to a little bit from the surface of the milk, but never above the liquid level, or the milk will be spilled everywhere. A steady "hiss" will be heard when it is in the right position, otherwise it will be very loud or almost silent. When the foam is sufficient, you can bury the steam pipe a little deeper and let the steam continue to heat the milk. The steam pipe had better be buried at an angle just enough to make the milk flow.

4. The steam switch can be turned off when the temperature reaches between 60 ℃ and 70 ℃.

5. Wipe the milk attached to the steam pipe with a wet dishcloth and release a little steam at the same time to avoid the difficulty of cleaning the milk after it is dry.

The methods of coffee drawing can be divided into three categories: direct injection forming method, hand drawing method and screen pattern method.

First, directly pour into the forming method:

Direct injection molding refers to the use of foamed milk, which is quickly poured directly into the espresso, in a state where the milk has not yet been separated from the foam. After the milk foam and espresso are merged into a certain saturated state, the hand shaking technique is used to make the milk bubble float on the surface of espresso using the principle of water ripple, and various sloshing control techniques are used to form a variety of graphics. The figures formed are divided into two categories, the first is the combination of various heart-shaped and leaf-shaped lines. The second category is the figurative line graphics of animals and plants.

Pouring directly into the shaping method is the most difficult way in the coffee flower drawing technique. Because this method has to pay attention to all kinds of details, from the state of espresso, the way the milk is foamed and the degree of organization, to the skill of combining the two, coupled with the direct injection molding method, the time for the formation of the pattern is very short, so it also requires very smooth and rhythmic movements and rapid and accurate hand shaking techniques, and most people will retreat because they are unable to meet these requirements. Therefore, if you want to become a real master of coffee flower drawing, you must constantly practice carefully.

Second, hand drawing shape method:

The hand drawing method is that on the coffee that has completed the fusion of espresso with milk and milk foam, using white dots or irregular patterns produced during the fusion, using toothpicks or needles, dipping with sauces such as cocoa powder or chocolate, various shapes are sketched on the surface of the coffee. Most of its graphics can be divided into two kinds, one is regular geometry, most of them use sauces of various colors to draw basic lines on the surface of the fused coffee, and then use toothpicks or needles to draw various regular geometry. The other is a figurative pattern, such as portraits, cats, dogs, pandas and other animal figures, most of which are now sprinkled with cocoa powder on the surface of espresso, then mixed with milk and milk bubbles, and slightly shake their wrists during fusion to form a ripple pattern on the surface of coffee, and then use toothpicks or needles to dip in sauces such as cocoa powder or chocolate. Various figurative figures are sketched on the surface of its coffee. These hand-drawn methods are not as difficult as directly pouring into the forming method, as long as you master some key details, you can make very beautiful hand-drawn graphics.

3. Screen pattern method:

The principle of the screen pattern method is very simple, generally divided into two ways of expression. The first way is to let the milk and the milk foam be separated for about 30 seconds after the milk has finished foaming, and then use a spoon to block part of the milk foam to first merge the milk with espresso, and then use a spoon to cover the milk foam on the surface of the coffee to form a snow-white surface. After that, use a screen or screen engraved with various shapes or words, place it about 1cm away from the surface of the coffee, and sprinkle cocoa or cinnamon powder on all kinds of screens and screens to make the coffee surface show various shapes or words. The second way is similar to the first method, but the difference is that do not wait after the milk foaming action, directly let the milk foam and espresso fusion action, to pay special attention to do not produce white foam on the surface of the coffee. Then use the screen and screen engraved with various shapes or characters, place it about 1cm away from the surface of the coffee, and sprinkle white sugar powder across all kinds of screen and screen to make its surface show various shapes or words.

The screen pattern method is the simplest of all coffee flower drawing techniques. You can carve a variety of shapes or characters on your own, or you can change it with a simple hand drawing method to create more interesting patterns.