Milk Frother - Milk Frother Review

Steam frothers work well to heat milk as it's whipped to a froth. The steam comes from a small wand that's usually attached to an espresso machine. it directs a pressurized stream of steam into your milk, that swirls and froths the milk.

The pros? it makes nice hot foam that won't make your coffee cold. It's classy and will score you lots of coffee geek points if you know how to do it right!

The cons are that they can be tricky to use and it takes a bit of practice to learn how to do it right. Also, you might not always want your foamed milk to be hot - what if you want a creamy whipped topping to put on fruit? Doesn't really work with a steam frother.

Oh - and you might not want to buy an espresso machine when all you want is frothy milk - in that case, there are stove top steamers, but again, there's an art to using them. If you want to let your inner barista fly free, go for it! If you think this may be too much hassle at 7:30 in the morning, you should probably pick another type of frother.

Ok, you can probably tell from the subtitle there that this is my favorite kind of milk frother. I like that it's convenient and simple to use, and I love that I can use it for so much more than making coffee. I'm all about tools that multi-task!

These frothers are self-contained little units that generally resemble a little blender of food processor. I like that I can do just enough milk for me, or enough for 2 or 3 friends at once - and the milk froths on its own while I'm off doing other things.

And unlike steaming milk, there's really no learning curve - just add the milk and let it do its job.

Many newer models will froth hot or cold, so you can get a lot of different uses out of it. My favorite, the Froth Au Lait Mini Stainless Milk Frother (shown above) even has a spout where you can add flavored syrups or powders to the milk as it's being frothed to give you even more options for coffees and desserts.