What milk is best for latte art?

Whole dairy milk, straight from the fridge. It is not close.

Why fat matters

Foam is bubbles held apart by protein and stabilised by fat. Skimmed milk has plenty of protein and almost no fat, so it foams readily into a stiff, dry, meringue-like foam that sits on top of the drink and refuses to pour. That is the opposite of what latte art needs.

Whole milk, at around 3.5 per cent fat, foams a little less eagerly and produces glossy, dense microfoam that flows. That flow is what lets you steer a pattern across the surface.

Semi-skimmed sits in between and works acceptably.

Cold, and fresh

Cold milk gives you a longer working window before it passes the temperature where air stops incorporating — more time to stretch and spin. Fresh milk foams more reliably than milk near its date, and UHT milk is unpredictable.

The jug matters as much as the milk

A sharp, low-set spout gives a thin, controllable stream you can steer. A rounded, high spout dumps a wide flow that sinks through the crema and buries the pattern. This is the cheapest meaningful upgrade in the whole chain — a good pitcher costs about thirty euros.

Fill it between a third and a half. Milk doubles in volume and needs room to form a vortex.

Plant milks

Barista-edition oat is the best of them and genuinely pours patterns, because the added fat and stabilisers replicate what dairy fat does. Barista soy works. Standard versions of either will not hold a pattern, and almond is very difficult.

And the coffee

A pattern needs crema to sit on. A stale or badly extracted shot with thin crema gives the milk nothing to float on, and the design sinks regardless of your pour.