MY NEW FAVORITE TOY
I have a thesis that needs writing. When, precisely, the thing is due is an interesting question. In theory it doesn't have to be done until the middle of May. My advisor set a date of April 1. Many of the schools to which I'm applying want to see something coherent by December 1. Various parts of it are due by Thanksgiving. And, finally, the idea is to have a draft all ready for initial editing by the second week of October.
The time, clearly, had come to break down and get a coffee maker.
That I had gone more than a year as a grad student without one was a source of surprise, shock, and some suspicion among my fellow students. "You don't smoke, you don't drink...you apparently don't drink coffee. Are you sure you're not Mormon?"
Appearances deceive, however. I didn't have a coffee maker not so much out of an aversion to coffee, but an aversion to regular coffee. It's just...too weak. It's just a kind of brown water with a sprinkling of caffeine. That, and coffee makers famously break--unless you buy an expensive one, of course, and then you're only able to make brown water for longer and more reliably.
That, and you're buying filters. I think filters are most of the problem, personally.
So, I put it off for a while, making do on fizzy caffeinated drinks...which led to predictable results, waistline-wise. So I cut those out, and have been flying by totally decaffeinated for a few months now. Good to catch up on sleep, anyway.
Still, with deadlines looming--and writing anxiety to be overcome with pure adrenaline--something had to give.
I explored my options. Wandering around Bed, Bath, and Beyond's coffee-making section, there was a lot to choose from. The prices ranged from $$$$$ all the way down to $$$...except, in the corner, this little device called a "Moka Pot" that came in two varieties, $ and $($/2). It claimed to make espresso. Better yet, it had no moving parts and you didn't have to plug it in anywhere. I did a little research, they sounded like a sufficiently simple way to make a sufficiently strong brew, so I picked up the $($/2) version (the $ one looked a little flimsy). Verily, it makes a fine mug of caffeine.
Still, doing my research, my semi-trained historian's eye was drawn to an even simpler device: the ibrik. Turkish Coffee isn't too common in the States; I'd only had it once, in a Turkish restaurant in Austin that went under nine months after I arrived. Still, I was smitten, and the long-ago memory of it lingered.
I found my way to Natasha's Cafe and sprung for the Millennium set. You get an ibrik, three samples of appropriate coffee, and some tastefully minimalist demitasse sets.
Making Turkish coffee is kind of a challenge. It's not the kind of coffee you start making, take a shower, and then come out and drink. You have to watch it like a hawk, and it takes a while to make right. You start by putting in too much sugar, then too little water, and then on top of the water you put in too much coffee. You don't stir; the coffee just rests on the top like a lid. It seems like it shouldn't work. You then put it on the stove on a fairly low heat, and wait for foam to form. As you do, the coffee slowly sinks into the water, forming a sludge on the top. It bubbles, you stir the bubbles down, and put it back on the heat. When it bubbles again, stir again, and back on the heat. The third time is the charm; take it off and wait for everything to settle down.
It's a near-run thing. There's not much of a margin of error; I made a mess my first time, and I doubt that'll be the last mess I make. It's easy for everything to foam over; you have to watch it carefully and have pretty quick reflexes.
But, when it's done, you have a magical brew on your hands. I like Natasha's "Cairo" blend, which has dark coffee and spices. Along with the too-much-sugar you added at the beginning, you get a very complex drink. Strong coffee, spices, sugar...you can see why some people use it as an ice-cream topping. You don't get a lot out of an ibrik; after a couple of demitasse cups you start getting too many grounds. At the very bottom, the remaining grounds look like a layer of brown toothpaste. You don't need much of this stuff, though. It's a lot of sugar and caffeine in a very small volume. You can stand a spoon in this stuff, which is just the way I like it.
I appreciate the simplicity of an ibrik. It's a specialized teakettle, basically, where you're just boiling stuff up in. As someone who's studied his share about the mediterranean in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, the kind of authenticity is also appealing.
And it's darned good coffee.
Consider yourselves strongly encouraged to try it for yourselves.
