Latte… man, to this day I still can’t figure out whether I actually love it or if it’s got me on a leash.

November 20, 2025. Overcast, a bit chilly.

I went again to that new café downstairs. The new barista’s latte art looks like absolute crap; the foam is so huge and coarse it reminds me of the bubbles left in the sink after doing the dishes. I was tempted to ask him to redo it, but the wind outside was brutal and I couldn’t be bothered to move, so I just sat there sipping slowly. Hot is hot, right?

Sipping, sipping, and suddenly 2018 came back to me. I’d just naked-quit my first job and spent every day zoned out in a tiny shop near Jing’an Temple. The owner was a Taiwanese guy named A-Jie with this super old-school tattoo on his arm that looked like it was done last century. He saw me camping there every day ordering the cheapest Americano, and one day he randomly brought over a latte and said, “On the house.” I was totally confused; we weren’t even friends. But that latte was perfect: coffee-to-milk ratio spot-on, not bitter, not cloying. Looking back, it was just… balanced. Sounds pretentious, lol.

Last month I went to see him again. Dude’s killing it now, four or five shops. I asked him what a latte even is, really. While steaming milk he goes, “It’s a compromise, isn’t it? Coffee too strong, add milk. Too much milk and you lose the coffee. Kinda like marriage.” I almost did a spit-take.

I remember reading somewhere that lattes make up over 40% of coffee sales in China. Makes sense; safe choice: not face-meltingly bitter, not diabetes-sweet. There’s this barista in Sanlitun, Beijing, Xiao Mei; I interviewed her once. She said, “I hate making lattes, good beans completely buried under milk, such a waste.” But then she added, “Still, tons of people get into coffee through lattes. You can’t just hand a newbie a light-roast Ethiopian washed Yirgacheffe and scare them off forever.”

Back in university it was all Starbucks lattes, thirty-something kuai a cup; felt insanely expensive. One finals week I pulled an all-nighter, and at 3 a.m. my roommate braved the cold to buy me a hot latte. By the time she got back it was half-cold and the foam had collapsed completely. I drank it and started crying. Not because it tasted good; just pure gratitude overload.

After I started working I went wild: trendy shops, dirty lattes, fresh coconut lattes, extra-thick milk lattes, gold-flake lattes… Instagram looked amazing, half of them tasted like someone had a personal grudge against me.

The best one I ever had was in a tiny alley in Kyoto. Old grandpa running the place, no English, my Japanese nonexistent; we communicated in wild gestures. His latte had zero latte art and was barely warm, but it was magical. I asked for the secret, he patted his chest and said something in Japanese; probably “made with love” or whatever. Cheesy, but it works.

Last year on Singles’ Day I impulse-bought a Breville semi-automatic in a moment of madness, determined to make lattes at home. Disaster. My milk foam was either snot-thin or stiff like meringue, extraction either over or under, kitchen looked like a bomb site. My husband seriously considered throwing both me and the machine off the balcony. Eventually I dropped two grand on a latte art class. Teacher’s wisdom: “It’s all feel, just practice.” Now I can finally make something drinkable, but I still prefer going out. At home there’s no hiss of the steamer, no chit-chat with the barista, no eavesdropping on the gossip from the next table.

These days it’s all dirty lattes, fresh coconut cold brews, cheese foam thick milk caps… some are great, some are pure tax on intelligence. A-Jie says young people today aren’t drinking coffee, they’re drinking “a lifestyle.” Sounds kinda salty coming from him.

While typing this, I finished the cup in front of me. The kid downstairs still sucks at foam, but the cup was warm and he gave me a shy smile, so whatever. Suddenly remembered that free latte from A-Jie seven years ago. Didn’t actually change my life; I still quit, still floundered for ages, still gained like twenty pounds… But every time I drink a latte, for some reason I think, yeah, things are gonna be okay.

That’s it. Heading out to buy groceries now.

(Lin Xiaoyu, Shanghai, 170 jin, still terrible at latte art, still needs one latte a day to survive)