The Chocolate Powder Dog

All of the skills you have learned will be absolutely instrumental in getting this one right. You will be creating the face of a puppy dog in your cup, and you’ll need to know everything about pouring rosettas, tulips, and hearts in order to do it. The puppy dog is one of the more difficult designs as it requires very fine tuned and subtle wrist movements in order to make it happen. You will need your miniature screwdriver that you would use to take apart a cell phone, along with some cocoa powder, for this one.

By now your ability to properly steam milk should be completely unconscious. You shouldn’t even have to remember to angle the steam wand to the side of the pitcher, near the end of the steaming process, to get the milk to swirl around the pitcher. The foam you make is always perfect, and the espresso tastes great. You are now ready to learn how to pour the dog.

Because this design involves the use of cocoa powder, you’ll want to begin by tapping your cocoa powder can several times over the espresso shot you have poured into your cup. Get a nice thick layer of cocoa over the espresso before you begin to pour your milk. This will mix with the espresso crema to add constrast and flavor to your new drink.

The powder dog design is created with a process similar to what one would do to make a tulip. It is highly recommended that you have a look at the tulip and rosetta tutorials before you start to make puppy dogs. The beginning of the puppy dog design starts out just like the tulip design. You will want to pour a kind of apple looking shape that is similar to, but not exactly like, the rosetta. Your wrist should be wiggling substantially, but you won’t be moving the steam pitcher back towards the other side of the cup. Stay in the middle.

The goal is to get a semi-circle shape that covers half of the cup. This shape should look like it has many layers of the espresso crema and chocolate mixture folded into it. The reason you are vigorously wiggling as if you were doing a rosetta is to get this layered folding effect. When half of the cup has your layered appley shape, you will be ready to move on.

Gently lift up the steam pitcher and get ready to do what you would do if you were pouring a tulip. You want to create another folded appley shape right next the one you just poured, but you want to do it in such a way as to make your new shape push the old shape around it. This is accomplished by directing the tip of the steam pitcher toward the old shape as you pour the new shape.

Your second shape should be about half of the size of the first shape. You can stop pouring it as soon as the milk is about 1/4 the total diameter of the cup away from the edge of the cup. Lift up the steam pitcher, but don’t strike through your design. If you did everything right, you should see an empty dog face shaped object. Congratulations. The hard part is over.

All that’s left is to use your miniature screwdriver to give some definition to the dog’s eyes, nose, ears, and mouth. Dip the screwdriver into the dark part of the cup, just underneath the dog’s nose and use the tip to draw in these features. Remember to wipe off your screwdriver with a paper towel every time you dip its tip into the white foam. You don’t want there to be any white under the dog’s face.

The chocolate powder dog shape is actually much easier than the tulip. If you are a master of that design, this one should come around in no time. It might even be more impressive to others than the tulip, if only because people love dogs more than they love flowers. Have fun and post your favorite powder dog on our website. We can’t wait to see it!

Learn more about making Latte Art in our Latte Art How To!