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Home arrow Articles arrow Brewing arrow Bare wanding - look ma, no turbofrother!
Bare wanding - look ma, no turbofrother! Print E-mail
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Written by glenn   

wand If you have a turbofrother equipped espresso machine, you will come to the eventually conclusion, perhaps with a tear in your eye, that you have progressed as far as you can go with these devices. They do produce prodigious amounts of foam and after several months of practice, you can coax some really nice microtexturized foam from these devices.

However, the siren call of true microfoam ever beckons. This means the device has to come off. No way around it. Ok it is off. Not so bad was it? Think of all the free time you'll save by not having to cleaning sleeves, "O" rings, inlet holes and crusted up wands. However, there is a problem - without the device, the wand is looking kind of short.

Trying to froth 4 ounces of milk in your 20 oz pitcher suddenly becomes a challenge. It is now a long, long reach to get to the milk! Not to despair - the purchase of a smaller 10 or 12 oz steaming pitcher should do quite nicely. Yes, you can easily reach the milk now. There is a bit of beneficial side effect to using a smaller pitcher even for conventional wand machines. Your wimpy Solis, Gaggia or Silvia machine is not likely to spin the milk right out of a 20 oz pitcher, but with a 10 oz pitcher, and 4 or 5 oz of milk, you've now got real power to play with. Go ahead and impress your friends and centrifuge that milk. You may even have to hold back!

You can try to spin 10 oz of milk in a 20 oz pitcher or spin 5 oz in a 10 oz pitcher, however I feel you get far better results by steaming two separate batches in the smaller pitcher, 5 ounces at a time. Try it!

You may have to adjust your technique to compensate for the small pitcher size. The conventional view is to start steaming in the center of the pitcher. Yes you can do this if you are very careful. However, there is a whole lot of turbulence happening in the first few seconds which may result in the big bubble stuff - the stuff you want to avoid. If you are having trouble with this you can start slightly off to the side. Here is the technique I use:

1. Insert steam tip deep in milk
2. Turn ON steam valve - a half turn or one full turn is plenty
3. Bring tip at, but not above surface- you will hear the chh..chh sounds
4. Bring tip to side of pitcher and get that milk/froth/foam whipping around
5. Keep an eye on the temperature - keep stretching until about 100F ( for latte foam ) or 120F or more for thicker cappuccino type foam. Experiment!
6. Once you've stretched enough (introduced sufficient air) you can move the steam tip deeper into the milk/foam and really spin the milk. Make it climb the wall of the pitcher if you want. If the milk is spinning too fast, you can slow it down by moving the steam tip towards the centre of the pitcher. Make sure the temperature doesn't get away from you. Things will start to happen a little quicker now. If you are aiming for 160F, you should be stopping (Turn valve OFF) around 155F. By the time you've turned off the steam valve you will have coasted up to 160F.
7. Give the pitcher the old Dave Schomer swirl for 10 seconds or so.
8. Admire your handiwork
9. See any difference?
10.Pack the turbofrother away with original packaging
 
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