Turkish Coffee
Türk kahvesitewrk kah-veh-see
Small, strong and thick, with a dense tan foam that should cover the whole cup and a layer of grounds below you do not drink. Anyone can make the coffee. The foam takes a low flame, a cold start and the patience not to stir.
At a glance
- Coffee : water
- 1:10
- Active time
- 1 min
- Total time
- 5 min
- Makes
- 1 small cup
- Serve
- Hot, with water
- Kit
- Cezve
Ingredients
Note: The grind is not optional. Buy coffee sold as Turkish grind or ask a roaster to grind it on their finest setting. Espresso grind is far too coarse and tastes gritty.
Method
-
Cold water, coffee and sugar
Measure the water with the serving cup into the cezve. Add the coffee and the sugar.
Cold water is the start of the foam. The long, slow climb in temperature is what builds it. Starting with hot water gives you no time.
-
Stir once, then never again
Stir until all the powder is wet and there are no dry islands floating on top. Ten or fifteen seconds.
After this the spoon is finished. Any stirring once the foam starts to form breaks it.
-
The lowest flame you have
Put it on a low heat and leave it. For two or three minutes nothing happens. Then a dark ring forms at the edge and a fine foam starts to gather and creep in from the sides.
On an electric hob use a medium-low setting. On gas, the smallest ring and the smallest flame.
3 to 4 minutes -
Spoon the foam into the cup
When the foam covers the surface and starts to swell, take the cezve off and spoon the foam into the cup. Gently, and all of it.
This is the trick most recipes leave out. The foam goes in first, so the coffee you pour later lifts it rather than breaking through it.
-
Bring it up once more
Return the cezve to the heat. In under a minute the coffee rises again. Lift it the moment it starts to climb. Do not let it boil.
30 to 60 seconds -
Pour slowly down the side
Pour the coffee slowly against the inside of the cup so it rises underneath the foam and lifts it to the brim. Serve with a glass of water. Let it stand for a minute before drinking.
A good cup has foam right to the edges with no holes.
Settle 1 minute
Why this works
Köpük, the foam, is the quality test for Turkish coffee, and it is made of three things: gas, particles and oil. Freshly ground coffee holds carbon dioxide from roasting. As the water warms slowly, the gas comes out of solution and rises, carrying the very finest particles to the surface with it, and the coffee's oils and proteins wrap the bubbles and hold them. That is why freshness matters so much. Coffee ground a month ago has lost most of its gas and will barely foam however carefully you heat it.
Slow heat matters because the bubbles need to be small. A gentle climb produces fine, even bubbles that pack tightly into a stable foam. Hot, fast heat produces big ones that rise and pop. A rolling boil collapses the whole lot and drives the aromatics off with the steam, which is why boiled Turkish coffee tastes flat and bitter.
Spooning the foam out before the second rise protects it from the heat. The foam has formed and you have kept it, while the coffee underneath gets a little longer to extract. Pouring down the side of the cup lets the liquid slide beneath the foam and float it up, instead of punching a hole through it.
Coffee reached Istanbul in the 1550s and the coffeehouse followed almost immediately. UNESCO added Turkish coffee culture and tradition to its list of intangible cultural heritage in 2013, which covers the ritual as much as the drink: the water first, the lokum alongside, and the cup turned over at the end for fortune telling.
Variations
- Sade: no sugar.
- Az şekerli: a little, half a teaspoon.
- Orta: medium, one teaspoon. The most common order.
- Şekerli: sweet, two teaspoons.
- With cardamom: one crushed pod in the cezve, the cardamom Turkish coffee of the Levant and the Gulf.
- With milk: sütlü Türk kahvesi, brewed with milk instead of water. Watch it closely, because milk rises much faster.
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Questions
Why does my Turkish coffee have no foam?
The three usual causes are high heat, stirring once it was warm, and stale coffee. Use the lowest flame, stir only at the start, and use coffee ground in the last week or two.
Can I make Turkish coffee without a cezve?
A very small saucepan works, but a wide pan spreads the foam thin. The narrow neck of a cezve concentrates the foam, which is the reason for the shape.
Is Turkish coffee stronger than espresso?
Per cup it carries a similar amount of caffeine, around 50 to 70 mg, because the grounds stay in contact with the water throughout. It tastes heavier than espresso because none of the fine particles are filtered out.
Do you drink the grounds?
No. Let the cup stand a minute so they settle, then drink until you reach the thick layer at the bottom and stop.
How do you make Turkish coffee for two?
Double everything in a cezve just big enough, and split the foam evenly between the two cups before the second rise. Then pour half the coffee into each, slowly. Making more than three at once in one pot rarely gives enough foam to go round.