Instead of fussing with steamed milk and trying to perfect the very difficult skill of making good latte art, which is very tricky to practice unless you have access to a good espresso machine and work in a coffee shop or drink a lot of coffee, a good way to decorate your drinks is with a stencil. Aerolatte sells a Cappuccino Art Set. The art set comes with a collection of stencils that can be placed on top of your drink and dusted with cocoa powder or cinnamon using a fine duster, similar to the type used for sprinkling powdered sugar. The six stencils are made of sturdy plastic, are dishwasher safe and come with a small storage tin. There is only one downside and that is the fact that you are limited to the designs that are provided. As elegant as the premade stencils are, if you want to make your own, you can use the exact same technique (perhaps even the same stencils) that we used for making cupcake stencils a few weeks ago.

I was at Border's the other day, getting my usual chai, when a woman came to the counter. I would say she was in her early to mid 50s, and when she got to the counter the guy asked her what she wanted. The woman scanned the menu, looked around the counter and said, "what's an espresso?"

This surprised me, because I thought everyone - well, at least everyone who drinks coffee, goes to coffee shops and had passed the age of 50 - would know what an espresso is. I thought of this while reading this Esquire column by director Barry Sonnenfeld. While directing the new ABC comedy Notes From The Underbelly, he decided to test several cappuccino makers on the crew, and he publishes the results.

Espesso is here.

No, you're not reading incorrectly and I didn't make a typo. Espesso is a creation of El Bulli chef/alchemist Ferran Adria and it is solid coffee. It is not frozen, but is made by combining "espresso and an ingredient [Lavazza, the company offering the product,] won't divulge, combined in a pressurized canister and left to set for 12 hours." The product is then sprayed out into cups, where it is so thick that it can be turned upside down and needs to be eaten with a spoon, much like a mousse with a strong coffee aroma. It is available in espresso, espresso macchiato and cappuccino flavors and the latter two flavors use milk that is solidified in much the same way.

Espesso was introduced at some locations in Europe in 2002. For the moment, it is available in three Chicago-area coffee shops - the only stores that Lavazza runs in the US - but if it is successful, we could see it spread to other coffee shops around the country.

Update: Dominic Armato, one of our busiest commenters, said that he had a chance to try this already at one of his local coffee shops. He noted that the espresso flavor "was POTENT. It had sort of a dense, wet mousse consistency" and that the macciato version, made with half-milk, half-espresso, was the best of the three espessos he tasted. Take a look at his full report, with great pictures of the product.

I have met many people who claim to dislike them "on principle", despite the fact that the majority of them cannot actually verbalize what their "principle" actually is. Some certainly can converse about their desire to see even more social responsibility or ways to further improve employee benefits, but the ubiquity of Starbucks is generally the favored topic of argument. Overhearing these irate rants can be an amusing experience when they occur inside a Starbucks from the mouths of people awaiting their Frappuccino or their extra hot, extra wet, no foam Venti "cappuccino", which they are unaware is actually a latte. Perhaps they are just annoyed with less-than-instantaneous service, though people who expect a decent coffee or espresso beverage should be willing to wait at least a moment or two for it to be prepared.

But I digress.

The next time I want to convince a friend that vanilla cake is actually far superior to chocolate cake, I'm going to give them a cup of coffee first. New studies done by Australian researchers show that having a cup of coffee before hearing an argument makes you more likely to agree with it, provided that the argument is convincing.

Caffeine, for a brief time, will increase your ability to concentrate and take in new information. When voluntary subjects were given a persuasive argument on a controversial topic after having coffee, they were more likely to agree with it than they were before they had the drink. They were also far more likely to be persuaded than the non-caffeinated control group. The subjects who had the caffeine processed all the information that was given to them in the argument, instead of relying on their preconceptions and simply ignoring the bits that they did not want to hear.

The researchers said that this information could be of great use to advertisers, who should attempt to get their ads seen in the mornings, when people are likely to be drinking coffee. It also means that if you want to convince someone that you're right about vanilla cake versus chocolate cake, or any subject, you should probably invite them out to breakfast.

[Photo by Nicole Weston]

The Slate wonders why the best cappuccino you can get is not on the menu board at Starbucks. Their reasoning follows economic lines and boils down to a fairly old business premise: charge whatever people are willing to pay and don't give them a cheaper option, lest they be inclined to take it. This is sound business advice and surely part of the marketing strategy of Starbucks. But there is another reason that they don't offer a short, 8-ounce cappuccino on their menu board: a lot of Starbucks customers don't know what a cappuccino is.

Based on my own personal experience, combined with the input of several friends who are currently or have been baristas, there are many, many people who order "no-foam cappuccinos" at Starbucks. A cappuccino is espresso with foamy, steamed milk topping it off. It should have equal parts coffee, milk and foam. Eliminating the foam and demanding that it be filled with milk instead (because the inevitably irate customer is "getting ripped off!" by the lack of milk) makes the drink a latte. I wouldn't be surprised if, at least in some small way, Starbucks simply wanted to avoid the hassle of having yet another size to argue over. This really only applies to the cappuccino issue, of course. People will argue over any size, regardless of how small or large it is.

Some drinks are just not meant to be. Witness the Carrot Cake Cappuccino. This drink, created by Bob Blumer of the Surreal Gourmet, is a combination of spiced, thickened carrot juice with sugar, oil and cream added to it and topped with foam. Very fortunately, Mr. Blumer did not combine cream cheese with the foam for some sort of frosting. Aside from appearing on the menu at Alinea for the sake of being innovative or just plain strange, I am not sure that there are too many venues for this particular beverage. I'd rather have a real cappuccino and a slice of carrot cake.