The Perfect Cortado
Like Duolingo, but for The Perfect Cortado. Tomo turns the whole topic into a game you play five minutes a day, until it actually sticks.
For the part of you with thirty open tabs that never became anything.
A short one: 8 levels across 2 sections, about 16 minutes end to end, roughly 3 days at five minutes a day. It moves through The Golden Ratio and Texture and Assembly. It starts from scratch.
Free forever · No credit card · iPhone & Android
Key ideas in The Perfect Cortado
- A cortado requires equal parts espresso and milk
- Milk in a cortado is meant to 'cut' or soften the espresso's intensity
- The 1:1 ratio is the defining characteristic of the drink
- The drink is designed to let the coffee flavor remain the primary focus
- Adding more milk than espresso turns the drink into a small latte or flat white
- The word 'cortado' comes from the Spanish word for 'cut'
- The specific ratio of espresso to milk that defines a cortado
- The flavor profile and purpose of the milk in a cortado
- A small 4.5-ounce glass (often a Gibraltar glass) is the traditional vessel
- Using a large mug would cause the small amount of liquid to lose heat too quickly
- Cortados use very little aeration to keep the foam thin
- The small glass size reinforces the 1:1 ratio
- Distinguishing cortado milk texture from other espresso drinks
- A cortado uses a 1:1 ratio of milk and coffee
- The appropriate vessel for serving a cortado
- A single shot is too diluted by the milk
You've tried the other tabs
Thirty open tabs. Four facts you actually kept.
You watched. You nodded. By Sunday it was gone.
One answer, then back to scrolling.
Eight weeks. You meant to finish. You didn't.
Tomo gives The Perfect Cortado the Duolingo treatment: levels, streaks, and quick quizzes that test what you just learned. That game loop is what the tabs above never had, so it's the one you actually finish.
Here's what playing it feels like
A real question from this course. Take your best guess.
What is the primary purpose of adding milk to a cortado?
Get it right to open this lesson and 7 more in the app.
Where The Perfect Cortado takes you
Master the art of the 1:1 ratio. Learn to balance bold espresso with silky steamed milk to create the coffee shop's most sophisticated small drink.
- 1
The Golden Ratio
- The Cortado Blueprint
- Pulling the Foundation
- 2
Texture and Assembly
- Steaming for Silk
- The Gibraltar Pour
2 sections · 4 units · 8 levels. Built to play, not to enroll.
You pick the voice
The Perfect Cortado is taught in the The Professor style: clear, structured, thorough. Want a different feel? In the app you can spin up the same topic in any of Tomo's teaching styles. Same facts, totally different vibe.
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Start The Perfect Cortado today.
Download Tomo, search The Perfect Cortado, and play your first lesson in under a minute.