A New Zeal!

From today I have a new zeal! I am starting to learn how to make original Khaleeji coffee or Emirati coffee.

2 years ago at Christmas Eve I successed in making an original Turkish coffee after 20 times of failures.
Now, I am heading forward to make Khaleeji coffee in memory of my years in the UAE as well as a kind of preparation before departing to Ras al Khaimah in winter.
But the first test at 27th October failed!

I asked my Syrian friend (who lives in Vienna for sure!) how to make „Arabic Coffee“ and she recommended me two coffee brands we can buy at „Naschmarkt“. At last Thursday I hurried there but no-one seemed to know these brands and I was tempted to buy „Najjar“-coffee from Lebanon.

I was sceptical because Lebanon is in the Near East and not in the Middle East but the seller was so typical for a seller in an Arabic souq: he assured me that this is one of the best coffees.

Hah – if I wasn´t despaired, I wouldn´t buy it, but I tried it if it´s really the Khaleeji coffee…

At home I opened the packing and saw a nearly black coffee – darker than any Turkish coffee like „Mehmet Effendi“ from Istanbul. My sceptic rosed more!

Well, let´s try and see.

I have to confess something: I don´t drink coffee!

What a laughter – I don´t drink it but I like to make it.

So my parents became my testing animals and the Lebanese-pseudo-Khaleeji-coffee became a disaster. The taste was too thin, to unspeakable!
But I used the traditional recipe from „The Complete Cookbook of the UAE“ of 1995!
Then it was clear that any coffee from Lebanon or any Near East area is not a so-called Saudi Coffee! The Saudi Coffee has an amber-color and mine was pitch-dark. No way!

I searched in the world wide web again and then a wonderful blog of an American expat living with her Palestine husband in Dubai explained everything so perfectly!

A real Emirati Coffee is made of raw coffee beans which should be roasted very lightly so it will have a light brown color – this is it!
But where to get raw beans in Vienna, the capital of the cultivated coffee society?

Again in the world wide web I found a „Caffee Compagnie“ which sells raw beans! Horray!

In the next days I want to try to get there and find a pack of Yemenite coffee or Ethiopian at last. And I will ask how to roast it perfectly.
I remember that there is an electric coffee roaster somewhere in the www too, but I want to stick on the traditional Emirati way. And this is roasting in the pan!

And how to grind the roasted beans? My mom and my grandmother had an electrical grinder, but I remember, it went broken and we threw it away.

To use a mortar and pestle like the old ways in the desert? This will take a long time and a strong wrist! Perhaps I will search my mothers kitchen in the hope to find and grinder which still works.

A new adventure and a new zeal lies ahead of me!

Please wish me luck!
I will keep you informed!