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Cappuccino is one of the coffee based drinks prepared with hot milk, steamed milk foams and espresso. It is different from caffe latte as it is made with less textured or steamed milk than caffe latte. Traditionally, cappuccino is served in porcelain cups that have better heat retention capacity than paper or glass. The foam on the top of cappuccino acts to be an insulator and helps in retaining the warmth of the drink. This allows the drink to be hot for a longer period of time and thus the drinker can enjoy it for longer.

The ingredients used for making cappuccino include roasted beans, fresh milk, coffee cup, cinnamon or chocolate powder and sugar. Another variation of cappuccino is ice cappuccino which is served with ice. While having a cup of cappuccino, here are few points that you must keep in mind:

• Never stir the drink with a spoon.
• Normally, you are not required to add sugar to it because cappuccino is already pretty sweet. But if you still want it to be sweeter, you can add a tea spoon of sugar to it and stir gently. Never add syrup as a sweetener because the syrup and milk are incompatible to each other.
• After drinking cappuccino, the foamed milk usually sticks to the bottom of the coffee cup. You can enjoy it with a spoon.

You must remember that if there is no foam left after drinking the cappuccino, the method of making the coffee was not perfect.

Besides espresso, one of the most significant elements in cappuccino is temperature and texture of milk in it. When milk is steamed for cappuccino, tiny air bubbles are introduced into the milk which gives it a sweetness and velvety texture. Variations are called cappuccino scuro with less amount of milk than the normal and cappuccino chiaro with more amount of milk than the normal. Attaining correct ratio requires proper attention while steaming milk. This makes the cappuccino a very difficult beverage to make. In addition to that, an expert barista can create artistic shapes at the time of pouring milk on top of espresso coffee.

Cappuccino had been a taste confined to Australia, Europe, South America, South Africa and cosmopolitan areas of North America until 1990s after which several upscale coffee shops started springing up. In Italy, it is usually consumed with the breakfast and not at any other time while in other countries; it can be drunk at any type of the day, even after dinner.