As a specialty coffee apologist one of the most challenging yet most important parts of recruiting new brethren is convincing people that coffee is more than a solvent for cream and sugar. If you’re reading this, chances are you’ve cringed once or twice watching a fine cup of coffee desecrated by “extra cream” or “extra sugar”. To clear the air sooner rather than later, there won’t be any follow up article by this author defending adding any sweetener to coffee. Coaxing out and appreciating the natural sweet notes inherent in well roasted coffee is one of the pleasures of specialty brewing. Modern diets are drowning in added sugars anyway; I just don’t see any place for this. As an aside, if you’re faced with a lousy brew and just need to make it drinkable, try a pinch of salt instead.

Alright, so when is a bit of cream/milk a benefit to specialty coffee? That’s ultimately for you to decide, but consider adding your cream in a metered fashion for the purposes of either weaning down how much you’re using or discovering just how little is really needed to change the body of the cup without washing out flavor notes. First, I would be weary of using any in more floral or acidic brews. It’s likely to curdle and those notes typically get best emphasized with less body, not more. I never add anything without tasting a brew as is first. Most of the time, I add nothing, but I don’t hesitate with cream for a medium or darker roast if I feel like I’ve missed the mark a bit on the body of the cup. I use whole milk, but choose whatever you prefer, just avoid things with flavor or sweeteners already added in. The key is adding very small amounts and doing it in reproducible way. If you already use milk and want to try backing down a bit, start at 5-10 mL and slowly wean your way down to 1-3mL per cup. You’ll notice some change in the body of the brew with as little as 1mL added, and you will not mask the flavor profile of the coffee with this small amount of milk added. I have tried doing this with a dropper, but the milk doesn’t last long in a dropper bottle, so I tried using a wine thief I had. Dipping this directly into the milk jug worked well, but it was far too large. I’ve switched to using a long glass pipette, and it’s worked very well for small amounts. I use it just like a wine thief (finger over the end of the glass pipet to siphon out a bit of milk directly from the carton). It is fragile, so be careful, but I’ve grown comfortable also using this as a stirring stick to mix the milk in after depositing it into the coffee. A hot water rinse out typically does the trick for the glass pipette and soapy water every once in a while keeps it pristine. You’ll need to find a good way to store it; I’ve been placing mine in a universal knife holder that consists of thousands of plastic strands that deform when you slide something in instead of conventional knife slots. Next time you have a jammy or chocolatey brew that tastes like it could use a bit more body, try playing with very small metered amounts of milk added in. It might be just the thing to salvage what might otherwise have been a mediocre cup.

Edit: TLDR - - consider adding a very small amount (1-5ml) of milk if your brew seems to lack body. If you use large amounts of milk/cream and are interested for health reasons or to better taste the flavor profiles of the beans you brew, using a precise measured wean can help tone down the amount you are using.