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Honorable Mentions
Instant Pot Milk Frother for $28: Best known for its world-beating, digitally controlled pressure cooker, Instant offers a BS-free milk frother at a reasonable price that won’t leave you feeling bad about buying it on a lark and using it only two or three times a year. This barebones machine has a simple function button that toggles through four options: cold foam, hot with light froth, hot with heavy froth, and hot without froth. The hot ’n’ heavy option yielded a dense glob of smooth, frothy milk with very little liquid at the bottom. A few whacks against the counter settled some bubbles and allowed about 3 ounces of liquid to sneak out of the bottom, and then the fluffy cloud of milk on top slid on top of the beverage in pillowy waves.
Nespresso Aeroccino 4 Refresh for $113: This funky little metallic tube is a dynamo at steaming small amounts of milk with maximum efficiency and minimal fuss. Pour in 8 ounces of milk, which is the recommended maximum for the unit, then pop it on the base and choose one of four modes: cold froth, hot with no froth, hot with light froth, and hot with heavy froth. About 1:45 later I got a thick glob of foam haloed by wet milk that hit around 150 degrees Fahrenheit, which is by far the fastest of the various units we tried out. The foam was too dense and immovable to blend with the wet milk, yielding very little gradient between liquid and foam for the sake of latte art. The end result was the type of cappuccino that’s good for three to four sips until the foam cools off, dries out, and clings to the edges of the glass in a bubbly, tan crust. Considering the flexibility offered by units nearly half the price this is not a great option, but it gets the job done and is worth keeping if it shows up on the gift table at a wedding or shower.
Melitta Montalatte Milk Frother for $110: We’ll forgive you if you have no idea Melitta made any notable contributions to the coffee space aside from the filters every coffee drinker buys once they’ve graduated from a “whatever’s in the pot” guy to a “my coffee-making experience is a ritual” guy. Melitta has quietly been plugging away in the coffee gear space for some time now, and its new Montalatte Milk Frother lands in the same tier as many of its other gadgets. It’s easy to use, it gets the job done without knocking your socks off, and it won’t break the bank. One notable design flaw is the weakness of the magnet that keeps the agitator attached to the base of the pitcher. You’ll need to remove it fully before attempting to pour, which can mess with the foam you’ve been building once the frothing process is finished. It’s easy to correct if you prefer to decant the liquid into a proper frothing pitcher and smack it around a few times there for good measure, but it took me by surprise the first time and almost made quite a mess.
Photograph: Pete Cottell
Maestri House Electric Milk Frother for $70: The marketing copy on the Maestri House website associated with its electric milk frother reads “Barista Finesse of Temperature and Thickness,” so it’s safe to assume this is yet another weird Amazon brand that always shows up alongside brands you’ve actually heard of when you search for gadgets. The manual told me to select medium foam, 150 degrees Fahrenheit, and 30 percent thickness for a cappuccino, so I fired it up and hoped for the best. There was quite a bit of separation between the liquid at the bottom and the dry froth at the top, which was best suited for a more classic style of cappuccino that’s equal parts espresso, wet milk, and dry froth at the top. No amount of banging the steaming pitcher on the counter or sloshing around the liquid would merge the dry froth with the liquid, so latte art was out of the question. The clump of dry foam on the top of my drink was pleasant for a few sips, and it reminded me of a simpler time when lattes and cappuccinos were the only drinks available that melded espresso with frothed milk. At any rate, this is a reliable frother with a simple interface and predictable results at a decent price.
Not Recommended
Bodum Barista Electric Milk Frother for $56: Bodum makes lots of gear at all sorts of price points, and the same-y design of many of its items makes it difficult to figure out which is which and why you should spend the extra cash for a unit that looks almost identical to a cheaper option with a similar name. On the first and third tests with the maximum 8-ounce dose of whole milk, it sputtered out of control and overflowed about three minutes into its excessively long five-minute cycle. I checked the instructions to make sure I wasn’t doing anything wrong, which revealed this unit should be essentially idiot-proof in its options. There’s a single button you press once for hot froth, twice for hot chocolate (no frothing action), and three times for cold froth. This should be impossible to screw up, yet there I was with a hot, white liquid oozing out of the lid and running down the sides of the machine and onto the counter. When I finally got a good run out of the machine, it yielded layer upon layer of gooey 160-degree Fahrenheit foam that could almost be folded over like a French omelet. It was nearly burnt and smelled like bread pudding. This is not a frother I would recommend to anyone under any circumstance.
With each unit I used 8 ounces of organic whole milk that was pulled from the fridge at 45 degrees Fahrenheit. I did not test any nondairy milks because of the wild variance in fat and sugar content, viscosity, and availability of each. Besides, we’ll probably be done with the hip alternative milk of the hour by the time this is published, rendering my extensive testing with fair-trade bird-safe macadamia milk useless.
I followed the instructions or quick-start guides that materialized after shaking out the box, and aimed for “wet froth” or a “flat white” if the instructions explicitly offered a process oriented toward that outcome. I swooshed the milk around in the frothing pitcher to get a better sense of the froth texture, decanted it, and attempted to pour an 8-ounce cappuccino with latte art. I did this three times with each frother and made note of the average time of its frothing cycle, the final temperature of the milk, and the consistency and texture of the frothed milk.
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