If you’ve fallen in love with the incredible taste of Arabic coffee, or qahwa, but never managed to recreate it at home, we’ve got you covered! This week Pink Jinn is collaborating with Medina Coffee to bring you the ultimate recipe for qahwa, so you can enjoy perfect Arabic coffee from home.
The art of cultivating, roasting, and preparing coffee was first perfected in the Middle East, and with hundreds of years of history in the region, coffee has become woven into the fabric of social occasions, from entertaining guests to marriage proposals.
In Jordan for example, coffee plays a key role in the Jaha ceremony, a traditional tribal event to agree a marriage proposal between two families. Coffee is prepared and served, but the attendees only drink when an agreement has been reached, to signal the accord between the two families.
A wealth of customs and etiquette around serving and drinking coffee have developed too, from hand signals to show how much sugar you take and shaking your coffee cup to say you’ve had enough, to fortune-telling using coffee grounds.
Given the importance of coffee in the Middle East, brewing the perfect cup is serious business! This week we’re lucky enough to share the wisdom of the incredible Medina Ilyas of Medina Coffee – she’s experimented with hundreds of combinations to create the ultimate, foolproof recipe to get unbelievably rich and flavoursome Arabic coffee each and every time.
The recipe that follows is for the perfect qahwa, traditionally served black and accompanied with dates or sweet treats, like halwa. But if you’d like to experiment with Middle Eastern flavours in other kinds of coffee, our fair trade medium-roast Yemeni coffee beans from the Pink Jinn Souq now come with an exclusive downloadable e-book of recipes, from an Arabic Macchiato to an Iced Qahwa infused with ginger.
So whether you like your coffee strong and simple or milky and full of spice, you’ll find a unique recipe to suit your taste! The Souq ships worldwide, so no matter where you are, you can order here to get a taste of Yemeni coffee beans, and your recipe book, so you’ll never be without the flavours of the Middle East!
Preparing the perfect Arabic coffee should be an experience to savour. Here is Medina’s carefully perfected step-by-step process to help you achieve amazing qahwa – it allows the aroma to build slowly and the flavours to intensify so you get to experience the ultimate Arabic coffee!
The Perfect Qahwa Recipe
Before you get started, make sure you have these basic tools on hand:
- Wooden spoon
The important thing here is to avoid using a metal spoon as it can affect the taste of the coffee, so always use a wooden utensil when you can – or to really step it up a gear, Medina’s secret trick is to use a cinnamon stick to stir her coffee, avoiding any negative impact on the flavour while adding a hint of warming spice!
- Measuring spoon
- Coffee pot or dallah
It’s no problem if you don’t have a traditional dallah, you just need a coffee pot or cooking pot which can be put directly on the heat.
- Cups to serve your coffee
Use traditional finjaan if you have them, but espresso cups work just as well!
Ingredients:
- 400ml water
- 2 tbsp ground Yemeni Arabica beans – we love using Medina Coffee’s fair trade Arabica
- ½ tbsp ground cardamom
- A pinch of saffron
- A pinch of cinnamon
- 1 tbsp distilled rosewater or orange blossom water
- Dates or halwa (optional, to be served with the coffee)
Method:
1. Begin to warm the water in the pot and add in the saffron.
2. When the water comes to the boil add the ground coffee and ground cardamom.
3. Stir gently using a wooden spoon (or cinnamon stick!) until it boils.
4. Once boiled, remove the coffee from the heat and let it rest for a moment.
5. Place back on a low heat for 5 more minutes.
6. Add the cinnamon and keep on the heat for another 2-3 minutes.
7. Remove the pot from the heat, add the rosewater or orange blossom water and allow the rich liquid to stand for 5 minutes to cool and settle before serving.
Serve in traditional Arabic coffee cups with fresh dates or halwa for an authentic Middle Eastern experience!
Brewing a fabulous cup of coffee is much easier if you start with the best coffee beans available, and we are so in love with our Yemeni Arabica at the Souq. Our Medina medium roast coffee beans take coffee back to its roots: they are grown in Yemen by Yemeni farmers and are among the highest quality beans in the world.
The single origin beans are grown on traditional mountainside terraces, and when perfectly ripe, they’re harvested and processed using traditional practices that are kind to the Earth, beneficial to the coffee farmers and support communities they live in. While only 1-3% of profits from the average cup of coffee sold in Europe and the US goes to the grower, the farmers who produce Medina’s coffee receive a minimum of 65% of her proceeds. Medina coffee is also accredited by the Specialty Coffee Association and 100% ethically sourced.
Even better, each sale supports Yemenis in 3 ways:
- Medina – who founded Medina Coffee – knows the farmers and their families personally and makes sure that they receive 65-75% of the proceeds of each of her sales.
- She also supports UNICEF Yemen’s work with children suffering the effects of the conflict in Yemen.
- On top of that, we at Pink Jinn donate 1/3 of our profits from every sale to Saba Relief (a charity run by British Yemenis), to support their humanitarian work with vulnerable people in Yemen.
Shop our Medina coffee at the Pink Jinn Souq, and receive your printable recipe book with your purchase!
And don’t forget, subscribers to our Hump Day newsletter get 10% off everything at the Pink Jinn Souq with an exclusive discount code – including our fabulous Yemeni Arabica! Sign up here!
Coffee-lover? Get an extra coffee fix here!
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