After many, many tries I think I am finally getting closer to figuring out “latte art” – making patterns on the surface of espresso crema with specially steamed milk. Here’s my best attempt to date:
It’s a weird hybrid of a rosetta and an apple.
To see much better examples of latte art, see this outstanding guide or just look over google’s results.
David Schomer has a commercial video for sale (which is terribly overpriced – $49.95 for 18 minutes), but fortunately there are a few free demonstrations out there.
I have to warn you, watching these is absolutely hypnotic :
http://www.coffeegeek.com/video/artigiano.mov
http://www.coffeegeek.com/tempphoto/sammy.mov
http://www.latteart.org/latteart.htm (click on “demo” for the movies).
Once I figure out the process completely I’ll post my own tutorial.