Common Ground - Latte Art Class

Houston Hot Spots organized a Latte Art class with Common Ground Coffee

If you're not a downtown rat, you'd probably never heard of Common Ground or their affiliates Amille's.  They're all around the tunnels.  Common Ground, however, is in the lobby of 5Houston Building across from Phoenician.  But that also means that they're not open on weekends.

To start, our teacher was explaining about the parts of an espresso.

 It's been 20+ yrs since I pulled a shot, and it doesn't look too bad.  They roast their own coffee, and that is pretty smooth on the crema, but still bitter for me to drink straight.

 Then the demonstration of pouring the milk and making basic design.

 Voila!  Here's the finish product.

 As we all take turn, the baristas are busy pulling more shots and 'cooking' more milk for us to practice.

 With help of the teachers, this one looks pretty presentable...

 When I tried it on my own, however....

 Definitely no where close to what the pros are doing here... geesh.

One more try before really giving up... Looked somewhat decent.

 The owner is generous enough to let us try whatever we want.  We have tried the Golden Milk which is tameric with local honey and milk, very soothing and I can see it help if you are suffering a sore throat.  They also have Matcha Latte, which has the true Matcha powder with also a bit of honey to cut the bitter.  

Another nifty thing they'd let us try was their Nitro Coffee.

 Reminds me of beer, lots of head and it does settle.  It is an acquired taste, like an frozen coffee but not slushy.  It is definitely cool, but if I were to drink it, I would do it with something else to cut the taste, even though I drink black coffee.  

What is unique about Common Ground is that they roast their own beans right here in Houston.  As a matter of fact, in Eado.  They created their own mix for espresso drinks to match the new trend of milk based drinks instead of the true Italian way of espresso straight.  So, they mix different blends to acclimate to the drinks they make and it's convenient for them to deliver all around down town.

Basically, Common Ground is the full fledge coffee shop with artistry of coffee and more varietion on drinks.  Versus Amille's are good for grabbing your typical lattes, cappuccinos to go back to your office.  Their barista is just as well verse since they are all trained at Common Ground before dispatching to other locations.  While I look forward to more Latte Art classes, I highly encourage you stop by Common Ground to try their coffee mix with Lavender Honey, that was not too floral, not over empowering flavors that gets you home.

Common Ground

1401 McKinney St

Ste 375

Houston, TX 77010

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