From Kev @ coffeeblog. Do This One Thing.

Hello   Kev here :-), Do This One Thing... Drop your milk temperature.   If you're a fan of milkies (flat white, cappuccino, latte), as I am, then there's one way to instantly improve the quality of your milkies, and that's to knock the temperature down slightly. You may have heard the very common advice that you shouldn't heat your milk up to any more than 65C? I concur with this, for cows milk, usually I find that if you take cows milk any hotter than this it flattens off the sweetness, and given that milk is of course the main component in milkies, if the milk is overheated to the point that it just tastes slightly flatter, it can have the effect of flattening the entire drink. By flatten off, I simply mean a dulling down of the taste.  For me, cows milk has a particularly enjoyable creaminess a sweetness, and both are dulled down the more you heat the milk. But here's the thing, you may think you're taking your milk to 65C, because you're using a temp control jug or a thermometer, but how precise is it? Possibly not as precise as you think.  So my advice is to try to heat your milk to as cool a temp as possible while still enjoying the drink. I'm not suggesting you drink luke warm latte, but if you properly pre-heat your cup before pulling your shot, this should give you a couple of C wiggle room so you can just take your milk to a slightly lower temp while still giving you a milky at the perfect drinking temp.  See my latest tutorial on milk steaming with the Gaggia Classic Pro.   Watch the Video In this video I steam milk with both the Sage Barista Express, and the Express Impress, while talking you through the differences between these machines.   Watch the Video If you don't have an espresso machine with a steam wand, by the way, and you're wanting a way to steam milk, see: Best Milk Frothers Alternatively if you're currently on the market for a coffee machine with a milk frother, have a look at this post: Best Coffee Machines Oat Milk & Other Dairy Free Alternatives While just dropping your milk temp slightly can help you to be able to create consistently great tasting milkies without occasionally taking the milk slightly over the edge, dropping the temp with some of the dairy free milk alternatives is even more important.    I went to really nice speciality coffee shop recently, I asked for a flat white, and thankfully I wasn't served what I would usually refer to as a "flat shite" which is when you go to a cafe that has flat white on the menu, and they serve you a cappuccino just without the chocolate sprinkles ;-), it had the right texture, but it just didn't taste quite right. I could tell what had happened, as I've done this many times when making my own, the oat milk had just been heated too much, and it tasted slightly wrong as a result. For oat, it does depend on which oat milk you're using, so I'd experiment, but personally I tend to take oat just a few degrees cooler than cows milk.  It's a similar deal with soy, it's not particularly temperature sensitive, so you should be OK with going up to a maximum of about 65C, but again just experiment and remember that properly pre-heating your cup or glass will allow you to have a slightly warmer drink without having to take the milk that additional one or two degrees hotter. Both Almond and Coconut are more temperature sensitive, with Almond you really need to be careful taking it over 60C or it can start to go a bit weird, you'll find the texture best when you take it a few degrees under this.  Coconut will often start to go really thick when you take it hotter, so you're probably best sticking to no hotter than 60C. So there you go, a nice simple one this week, whatever milk or milk alternative you use for your milkies, make sure you properly pre-heat your cup, and just try dropping the milk temp slightly so that the milk or plant based alternative doesn't start to take on a slightly odd taste that ruins your coffee. I hope you enjoyed this edition of Brew Time, and I'll see you next week :-).  Thanks again, Kev coffeeblog.co.uk cworks.co.uk Follow me on Twitter Follow me on Instagram Follow me on Facebook Subscribe to my YouTube Channel Become an Accredited Coffee Botherer

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