Cappuccino Coffee

Since we bought the espresso machine (this one from Amazon) last year, I have becoming so obsessed with coffee and making espresso drinks at home.  Top three popular coffees in the house are Americano, latte and cappuccino.

Ingredients:

1 shot of espresso
6 oz whole milk (it will make your coffee taste much better than the one made with non-fat milk)
a pinch of coco powder (optional)

All above are all small/regular size cappuccino.  Sometimes I find it not strong enough.  So I would use double shots of espresso, plus 8 to 10 oz whole milk to make a large one.

Make the espresso with espresso machine. 

With the steam wand, froth the milk until it is creamy and full of micro bubbles. If you are using a thermometer, stop when it reaches 140F/60°C to 150F/ 66°C.  Or, with some practice, you can always tell whether the milk is ready by the touching the milk pitcher.  

Frothed milk for cappuccino should contain more micro bubbles because more air is introduced to the milk.  It is also stiffer.

Pour frothed milk into freshly made espresso.  Sprinkle with a pinch of coco powder. 

Look how creamy and smooth it is! O(∩_∩)O~ 

Latte Coffee 2

中文： 拿铁咖啡

Both my husband and I like to enjoy a cup of good coffee from time to time.  Sometimes we go to local coffee shops, and sometimes I make the coffee for us.  They may not be as good as the ones in store, but we have so much fun making and drinking them together. O(∩_∩)O~

Latte coffee is one portion of espresso, one portion of steamed milk plus another portion of frothed milk.  You can make them look good by pouring frothed milk into espresso or by creating artistic patterns with chocolate sauce or caramel sauce.  Both of them are available in store, but I like to make my own from scratch. 

For chocolate sauce:

1 single shot espresso
1 to 2 tablespoon sugar
coco powder

Make one single shot espresso (I use this machine from AMAZON); stir in sugar and coco powder when it is still hot.  Set aside to cool down.  I didn’t write down how much coco powder is needed here because espresso shots are different from machine to machine.  Just keep stirring in coco powder until the espresso thickens like syrup. 

My favorite coffee is latte with caramel sauce on top.

For caramel sauce：

1/2 cup of packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon water
1/4 cup heavy cream
2 teaspoons butter

 

Directions：

Combine brown sugar and water in a pot; heat over medium heat.  Stir from time to time.  I add water to make sugar melt fast and evenly.  After all the water evaporates, the syrup will turn amber color.  Add butter.  When butter hits hot syrup, it may splatter.  Be careful not to burn yourself.

After the butter melts into syrup, keep cooking for another couple minutes until the syrup becomes dark amber color.  Add heavy cream while stirring.  It is going to splatter more vigorously, so please be extra careful.

Cook caramel sauce for another 30 seconds to 1 minute.  Remove from heat.  When it cools down, you can bottle the syrup.  It is good to go onto coffee, ice cream, cake, cookies or any dessert of your choice.

As for me, I like to top my latte coffee with caramel sauce.  It is indeed heavenly.