Dualit Cino Milk Steamer | 850ml Capacity | 1450W | Brushed Stainless Steel | Portable and Compact | Milk Jug & Thermometer Included | 84850

Excellent for warming and frothing milkEasy to operate and clean

I pair this with my custom gaggiuino espresso machine and my DF54 coffee grinder. When I make back to back espresso’s on a single boiler, i need a stand alone milk steamer / frother. This is the closest you’ll get to a barrista level machine. None of that “milk frother” spiny crap in which you’re required to steam the milk before hand for a sub par - separated frothey fake milk.

If you don't know what you're doing, you can easily end up with the milk over-frothed and not suitable for latte art. Go to youtube and search for "how to steam milk for latte art", and you'll be making beautiful micro-foam in no time. The same technique can make silky smooth hot chocolate.The steam wand takes about 30-secs to 1 min to heat up. As you turn the dial to let steam through, there is a thumping noise as the pump gets going - it's not too loud and goes away as you turn the dial further. I have a manual espresso maker (Rok), and get that all ready, then turn on the steamer, add the water to the Rok and by the time I've finished expressing the espresso, the steamer is ready to play. I'm so happy I bought this machine.I live in a hard water area, so to extend the life of the filters, I soften the water:1) boil the water in a clean saucepan (not a kettle - although you can pre-heat in a kettle if you like). This will separate a lot of the limescale from the water.2) Allow the water to cool and then decant into a BRITA water filter or similar, being careful not to let the residue from the pan slide in (this will also preserve the filter in the BRITA)3) When the water has filtered through, tip it into a jug for later use in the steamer.This will create fairly (not entirely) pure water, which will allow the taste of the coffee/chocolate and milk to shine through.

This steamer is more powerful than the one that came with my other home coffee machine, but having had it now for six months, I have still been unable to produce consistent Latte Art despite spending a fortune on stainless jugs and working really hard at it. I have used a 6.5kW commercial coffe machine with steamer to do latte art, but it is a world apart from this product, it has four steam jets on the tip instead of the one steam jet this machine has, and it can take a 250ml jug from cold to 70C in a few seconds whereas this machine takes maybe a minute. I was talking to a guy who sells professional machines, and I said I want a home steamer with a tank so I can make coffe shop quality late art for use with my home Nespresso capsule machine which gives i think coffee shop quality expresso shots. But he said in his opinion its not really possible, the smallest pro machines are rated at 3KW and have lots of expensive technology, and need expensive servicing, and do not just switch on and off effortlessly, e.g. so you knock out a cup for breakfast instead of leaving it on all day.So what can I say? With this machine you get proper foam for your nespresso machine instead of using e.g. that silly frother with the spinning widget, and your friends will be amazed at the quality of your lattes especially if like me you mix 33% double cream into 66% full fat milk and use two or three Arpeggio capsules per cup. But don’t expect them to wow them with your latte art hearts and ferns etc, it just won’t happen for you, and don’t waste your life trying like i did.Other comments: Descaling? I do mine outside and leave it going crazy till it gets through a bottle of undiluted descaler. I have hard water, after a few weeks it gums up completly and no steam comes out just dribbles of hot water.

We have had a Nespresso machine for nearly a decade (Krups Pixie) and it's still going strong. We wanted to replace our (third) electric milk frother, which was slow and had a relatively low capacity - it would take 20 minutes to heat and froth enough milk to make two medium-large lattes.Having been a fan of Dualit appliances for over 20 years we thought we'd give this a go.GAME CHANGER. This thing is a beast. Can heat and froth enough milk for two extra-large lattes simultaneously in about two minutes, with room to spare. I suspect the jug capacity is sufficient to make 4 medium-large lattes simultaneously. Less milk, for smaller lattes takes less time.One thing worthy of note is that with the electric milk frother you could only really describe the heated milk as "warm" not "hot". Not so with this; If heating the milk to the "optimum" zone, as identified by the included thermometer which clips onto the included milk jug, the milk is HOT. We haven't made hot chocolate with this yet but I already know it's going to be awesome.Super easy to operate. Looks good. Easy to clean. Frankly, if you're a fan of various types of coffee in the home this thing is a necessity unless you have a high quality steam-wand integrated into your existing coffee machine.There's a couple of things to note, which I didn't find immediately obviously until it arrived:1) the water tank has a water filtration system integrated into it. Dualit recommend that if using the machine daily you want to replace the filter monthly, if not a daily user, every two months is sufficient. Filters work out to £26/year if using Dualit ones replaced monthly. An ongoing cost but not particularly onerous compared to the amount we spend on coffee pods. The machine is supplied with 3 filters, i.e. 3-6 months worth.2) The machine is larger than you would perceive it to be from the picture. Ours is placed next to a very high capacity 1000 W microwave - it's 2 inches taller than the microwave. It slides underneath our wall-mounted kitchen cabinets with about 3 MM to spare.Neither of these things is particularly a negative issue, it's just something to be aware of before purchase to manage expectations.