Coffee

By Ana Vidosavljevic

Posted on

The ritual of drinking coffee has always been something special in my family. Not only in
my family but in Serbia in general.

This centuries-old tradition of drinking black coffee was inherited from Turks while Serbia
was under the Ottoman rule.

The Turkish black coffee has always been the favorite coffee of all Serbs. Even when the burst of different coffee flavors has overruled the habit of drinking black coffee in other European countries, people in Serbia have remained loyal to the strong black coffee that had a unique way of preparation and smelled and tasted heavenly. No Serb would ever say that any other coffee tastes better. And rarely anyone in Serbia drinks any other coffee first thing in the morning except the Turkish coffee. Many people refer to it as “Serbian coffee” nowadays, but there are still those who keep the original name “Turkish coffee” in the honor of Turks who brought it to Serbia. Its strong and delicate flavor and splendid fragrance is the only real mood and energy booster Serbs would recommend.

My grandma Gordana, my mother’s mother, was a coffee lover. As long as I remember, she would wake up, brush her teeth, comb her hair, and make her morning coffee. The morning coffee was a must. A necessity. Something she couldn’t miss and didn’t want to. No other chores could have been done without a cup of coffee which she claimed was the best brain booster. I believed her. And since I copied everything she did, I wanted to drink coffee as well. But I was too young to drink the pure black Turkish coffee. It would have caused my heart beating faster and my blood pressure would rise and I guessed, it was not the nicest thing that could happen to a child. Caffeine was a powerful substance and I was not big enough to respond to it normally. However, my grandma thought that a little bit of coffee and caffeine was good for everyone and she let me drink a bit of coffee. But I had to diminish its power by pouring the milk and adding a lot of sugar to my black coffee.

Moreover, my grandma always had some delicious cookies she had made, so I loved dipping them in my coffee. Coffee-soaked cookies were the delicious pleasure I took up and ate every time I drank coffee with my grandma. It was our sacred ritual which we both enjoyed. First, my grandma Gordana would put a pot for the Turkish coffee called dzezva (a special wide bottom pot, usually made of copper) filled with water on the stove. She would wait until the water heats up and start threatening of leaving the confines of the pot. Then she would put two full tablespoons of sugar and after two full tablespoons of coffee. And then, she didn’t let it do whatever it was supposed to do by itself.

Instead, she would constantly stir it and turn the heat to medium or even low. I was always watching her while she was doing this. Her hands were moving graciously but steadily, and her eyes didn’t lose focus even for a second. If they did, the brew would skip out of the pot and spread all along the stove and floor making a big mess. After my grandma had stirred it for a while, the brew would start to foam. And the bubbles would appear on the sides forming the ring. Then, she would turn off the stove and remove the pot from it. She would stop stirring the brew. As she said, stirring it in that stage would kill the foam, actually a very thick froth which was very important. That froth gave the unique taste to the Turkish coffee. And it was a sin to destroy it.

The way the Turkish coffee smelled and tasted, its aroma, was its signature characteristic. Its strong, bitter, sometimes winey and chocolate-like smell always spread through the room and corridor of my grandma’s house. It was so appealing that often it invited the other house dwellers (my grandpa, uncle and auntie) to join us and have a cup of coffee. We would all sit together and enjoy it in our own way. I would soak my cookies in it, slowly and carefully making sure that I don’t oversoak them. They needed a quick dip, otherwise they would crumble and those crumbs would stay inside the coffee cup. My grandma sipped her coffee. She was not in a rush of finishing it. She would often leave the cup of coffee on the desk and continue doing some of her house chores. Once in a while, she would take a sip of her coffee which busted her energy and again retreat to her work. Her coffee often lasted few hours. My uncle was usually in a hurry and he would finish his coffee in a gulp. After he drank it, I could see the steam coming our of the empty cup and wondered if he had brunt his tongue. But obviously he didn’t since this was his usual way of drinking Turkish coffee. My auntie would sit with me and my grandma and chat while sipping her coffee. She stayed for a while with us enjoying the coffee aroma that refined our senses and improved our mood. At least while drinking coffee, we were all in a good mood, chatty, garrulous, cheerful and high-spirited.

My grandma Gordana used to say that the trick of making a good coffee is in grounding the coffee beans to powder texture. Even though most of people buy already ground coffee, she preferred buying the coffee beans, roasting them and grinding them in the Turkish coffee grinder she inherited from her mother. She would put a handful of fresh roasted coffee beans in the grinder and then manually, while watching TV, she would grind them. It was a long process that sometimes lasted half an hour or even forty minutes because she believed that the beans should become a fine powder. And when she finished grinding the first handful of coffee beans, she ground another one and another one until her hands got tired. That ground coffee, the work of my grandma’s hands tasted the best. I enjoyed it so much that I have never found any other coffee which tasted better. 

Many years after, when my grandma passed away, and her Turkish coffee grinder became the house decoration, I remembered the aroma of my grandma’s coffee. Its alluring scent, a bit robust and cinnamon-like, and its bitter sweet taste still stayed in the corners of my mouth. Its aftertaste seemed to be eternal, unforgettable. It remained lingering for decades. And the magic of the old Turkish coffee grinder, grandma’s graceful hands and skills for making the perfect Turkish coffee left the lasting impression in my memory.

Ana Vidosavljevic