“To give me a cup of coffee, a favor that I will keep for you for forty years.” A popular Turkish proverb expresses the extent to which the Turks are connected to their coffee, which has become known in the world, and despite the fact that there is not a single narration about the origin of Turkish coffee, coffee has become associated with the description of “Turkish”, and it has become The state of Istanbul is a landmark that demonstrates it.
On December 5 of each year, the world celebrates the “International Turkish Coffee Day”, after it was included in the list of “intangible cultural heritage” prepared by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization “UNESCO” in the Azerbaijani capital Baku in 2013.
The ground coffee bean is boiled in a jug with water, and served in small cups, where the scum rests on the bottom.
Turkish coffee cups were known to have special touches in which the Ottomans excelled, in terms of their decoration.
Turkish coffee is characterized as having a “foam” (al-wash in Arabs), and it is made from the finest types of ground coffee, and it is cooked until boiling, and many Turks put sugar in it during its cooking, and it is served in a small plate with a glass of water and a piece of lokum.
Although the coffee plant was not grown in Turkey, the method of preparing it, which begins with roasting and ends with pouring into the cup, is called all over the world the method of cooking Turkish coffee, and perhaps the association of coffee with the Turks is due to the efforts to spread it by the Ottomans, and the emergence of Istanbul as one of its stations.
It is known that the origins of “coffee” go back to the Arabian Peninsula, and although the information associates it with the physician Al-Razi in the tenth century, its use began around the year 575 AD.
It is said that the physician Al-Razi, who lived in the tenth century of Hijrah, was the first to mention coffee and Al-Bisham in his book Al-Hawi. It was intended to these two words coffee and fruit drink.
Some researchers believe that the origin of the coffee name comes from the city of Kaffa in southwestern Ethiopia, which is believed to be the cradle of coffee production.
The story says that an Ethiopian shepherd used to play the flute to gather his goats in the evening to return home. One day, he played the goats, but they did not respond, and began searching for them everywhere. After a long search, he found them eating leaves and jumping and butting. And the next day the same thing happened, so he decided to taste the bitter tree seeds and chew them, and he liked it, and so was the discovery of coffee, as the legend says.
Some researchers say that the word “al-Kafi”, which was used by the Arabs to refer to a “kind of wine”, was modified and its name settled in this way.
Coffee was originally known in Yemen and then in Mecca and Medina. By the end of the fifteenth century, it spread through travelers in Iran, Egypt and Turkey, and from there to European countries.
Historians mention that the campaigns of the Ottoman Sultan Yavuz Selim to Egypt played an important role in the spread of coffee and the expansion of its popularity in the Ottoman lands.
Coffee in the Ottoman era
There are two accounts regarding the arrival of coffee to the Ottoman Empire . The first is that two Syrian merchants were the first to bring coffee to Istanbul in 1554 AD.
As for the second novel, Ozdemir Pasha, the ruler of Yemen in the Ottoman era, brought coffee beans to Istanbul, and thanks to him coffee became a habit for the sultans, and a “cafe” was allocated to them inside the palace, while “cafes” spread after that in Istanbul.
While drinking it on a daily basis from the Ottoman sultans, the coffee water that the sultan drank, was brought from a high summit (Qumush Soyu) in the Eyup district of Istanbul.
Istanbul was then distinguished by the spread of cafes, frequented by tourists, and a street was named “Roasting” in the “Aminonu” area of Al-Fateh, because of the region’s fame for serving Turkish coffee. Thanks to the merchants and travelers who came to Istanbul and the Ottoman ambassadors, the popularity of Turkish coffee reached other countries.
Caffe shops for the Singles and authors
The first café was opened in the Ottoman lands for single men (unmarried) in the neighborhood of “Malik Germes”, which is known as “Tehta Qala” today, which means under the castle.
Gradually, coffee and cafes became an element of cultural life, turning into “kıraathane” places, meaning “reading place”, where people gather, drink coffee while chatting and reading books.
Moreover, these became the places where stories were told, and where the “oral literature” traditions of the literati were held in their performances.
Many well-known writers have written their books while sitting in those cafes.
When did Turkish coffee arrived to Europe and Russia?
Turkish coffee reached Europe, with the appointment of Suleiman Agha as one of the ambassadors of the Ottoman Sublime Porte in 1669 and transporting it with him.
Some accounts mentioned the way Turkish coffee was transferred to Austria, and some references said that after the Ottoman army withdrew from the siege of Vienna, he left coffee bags behind, after which a Jewish man of Polish origin who worked as a translator with the Ottoman army, called Franz Georg Kolschitzky, acquired those bags. And opens the first Turkish coffee cafe in Europe.
Some historians state that coffee arrived in Russia in the fifteenth century from the Ottoman Empire, after the first exchange of ambassadors between them.
According to historian Samuel Collins, “the brewed coffee, which the Persians and Turks usually consume after dinner, is a good medicine for flatulence, runny nose and headache.”
The son of Tsar Alexei Mikhailovich, better known as Russian Emperor Peter the Great, was a big fan of coffee.
While it is believed that Peter the Great became acquainted with the drink while traveling to Europe, Europe originally adopted the custom of drinking coffee from the Ottoman Empire.
The other Russian document that indicates that coffee is also related to the Ottoman Empire, dates back to 1709, when “boyar” Ivan Tolstoy sent about 20 pounds of coffee from Taganrog, the first Russian naval base and seaport, to support Peter the Great, who was preparing to fight Sweden near Poltava (Central Ukraine).
When Russia signed a peace treaty in 1791 with the Ottomans, diplomatic gifts from the Ottoman authorities to Russian representatives included 1,480 pounds of coffee, along with jewelry and thoroughbred horses.
During the wars between Russia and Turkey, coffee and the “kana” – the long-handled vessel used to make Turkish coffee – were spoils of war.
Because the Russians did not have any idea of the name that could be given to the coffee-making pot, they called it “Turka”, in relation to the nation from which they were inspired by this custom (Turkey), and the name became present in the Russian language and is used to this day.
In the southern regions, the coffee was initially called “kave”, but later became “kahve” (coffee), which is the Turkish word for coffee.
In the northern regions, the word became “kava”, which was later converted by the European pronunciation to “coffee”.
In addition to the Europeans, the Russians call unfiltered coffee, which is prepared from ground coffee beans to powder, “Turkish coffee”.
The name of Turkish coffee in Greece was changed after the Cyprus operation, and they began to call it “Greek Café”, and thanks to the efforts of the Greek lobby, “Café Grek” became popular in many countries.
Coffee after breakfast! Salted coffee is a Turkish habit
The British have a tradition of drinking tea, the same concept formed in the Turks to drink coffee.
In Turkish, the word “breakfast” (Kahvaltı) means “my coffee”, and it means the food that is eaten after coffee.
Turkish customs with coffee
In Turkish cultur there is a funny custom related to coffee , which is the “salty groom’s coffee”, which is a unique tradition in that culture and one of the most important customs that is still popular with the Turks.
When the groom proposes to a girl from her family, she puts salt in the coffee instead of sugar, and he is required to drink the entire cup without showing any resentment on his features.
The idea behind this is to test the groom, and the extent of endurance and patience that the bride will have, so he puts a quantity of salt in the coffee cup.
There is also a common culture among the Turks since the era of the Ottomans, to serve water with a cup of coffee, and some believe that water is served with coffee to see if the guest is hungry or not. Drink coffee before water, it means that he does not feel hungry, so they do not burden him.
As for the story of lokum with coffee, if the guest ate the lokum after drinking the coffee, this means that he is grateful and pleased with the hospitality and welcome, but if he left it on the plate and did not eat it, then this means that he is not satisfied.
Also, instead of reading “tea leaves”, the Turks have a habit of reading “fal” with a cup of coffee, and there are many places spread for this in Turkey, especially in Istanbul.
Turkish proverbs about coffee
Among the most prominent Turkish proverbs about coffee:
“To offer me a cup of coffee is a favor that I will keep for you for forty years.”
“For coffee to be coffee, it must be bitter, not like love, but like death.”
– “Even if there is no one next to us, coffee is always made for two.”
“Even bad coffee is better than no coffee at all.”
– “I left the coffee, believe me, it is more difficult than separating a person from his beloved.”
“Coffee is bitter, but bitter is sweeter in the love hidden in its name, because in its taste there is love.”
How do you prepare the perfect Turkish coffee?
Many Turks believe that there are two main things to making perfect Turkish coffee, to have the right technique and to have the passion. Even if you are inexperienced, you can still make excellent coffee with the right technology.
According to the Turkish newspaper Hurriyet, the history of Turkish coffee is much older than the history of the country’s first coffeehouse, which opened in Istanbul in 1554. For this reason, Turkish coffee has been included in the UNESCO Intangible World Heritage List.
How to prepare Turkish coffee
The newspaper stated that if you want to follow the traditional way of preparing coffee, you should use coffee beans from Yemen or Ethiopia, knowing that all “Arabica” beans are also suitable.
It is important to grind the coffee immediately before preparation and obtain a powder similar to that of lime, and this is possible using a Turkish manual grinder, although it requires a little patience when stirring. Any good espresso machine can grind fine coffee beans.
The pot is filled with four cups of cold water, adding three or four teaspoons of sugar to the water, without stirring, and then placed on the fire. Once the water boils, remove the pot from the stove and add four teaspoons of coffee powder to the water and stir the mixture well.
The pot is placed on the stove again, and once the coffee boils, you need to lift it. The surface can be gently moved with a small spoon to get rid of large bubbles of foam, but you should not move the entire coffee drink inside the pot. After this is done, put the pot on the stove again and boil it twice.
Thus, the coffee is ready, and it can wait 30 seconds before pouring it into the cup.