‘a plea for difference itself’: Mahmoud Darwish on coffee

Gently place one spoonful of the ground coffee, electrified with the aroma of cardamom, on the rippling surface of the hot water, then stir slowly, first clockwise, then up and down. Add the second spoonful and stir up and down, then counterclock­wise. Now add the third. Between spoonfuls, take the pot away from the fire and bring it back. For the final touch, dip the spoon in the melting powder, fill and raise it a little over the pot, then let it drop back. Repeat this several times until the water boils again and a small mass of the blond coffee remains on the surface, rippling and ready to sink. Don’t let it sink. Turn off the heat, and pay no heed to the rockets. Take the coffee to the narrow corridor and pour it lovingly and with a sure hand into a little white cup: dark-colored cups spoil the freedom of the coffee. Observe the paths of the steam and the tent of rising aroma. Now light your first cigarette, made for this cup of cof­fee, the cigarette with the flavor of existence itself, unequaled by the taste of any other except that which follows love, as the woman smokes away the last sweat and the fading voice.

 

Now I am born. My veins are saturated with their stimulant drugs, in contact with the springs of their life, caffeine and nico­tine, and the ritual of their coming together as created by my hand. “How can a hand write,” I ask myself, “if it doesn’t know how to be creative in making coffee!” How often have the heart specialists said, while smoking, “Don’t smoke or drink coffee!” And how I’ve joked with them, “A donkey doesn’t smoke or drink coffee. And it doesn’t write.”

 

I know my coffee, my mother’s coffee, and the coffee of my friends. I can tell them from afar and I know the differences among them. No coffee is like another, and my defense of coffee is a plea for difference itself. There’s no flavor we might label “the flavor of coffee” because coffee is not a concept, or even a single substance. And it’s not an absolute. Everyone’s coffee is special, so special that I can tell one’s taste and elegance of spirit by the flavor of the coffee. Coffee with the flavor of coriander means the woman’s kitchen is not organized. Coffee with the flavor of carob juice means the host is stingy. Coffee with the aroma of perfume means the lady is too concerned with appearances. Coffee that feels like moss in the mouth means its maker is an infantile leftist. Coffee that tastes stale from too much turning over in the hot water means its maker is an extreme rightist. And coffee with the overwhelming flavor of cardamom means the lady is newly rich.

 

No coffee is like another. Every house has its coffee, and every hand too, because no soul is like another. I can tell coffee from far away: it moves in a straight line at first, then zigzags, winds, bends, sighs, and turns on flat, rocky surfaces and slopes; it wraps itself around an oak, then loosens and drops into a wadi, looks back, and melts with longing to go up the mountain. It does go up the mountain as it disperses in the gossamer of a shepherd’s pipe taking it back to its first home.

 

The aroma of coffee is a return to and a bringing back of first things because it is the offspring of the primordial. It’s a journey, begun thousands of years ago, that still goes on. Coffee is a place. Coffee is pores that let the inside seep through to the outside. A separation that unites what can’t be united except through its aroma. Coffee is not for weaning. On the contrary, coffee is a breast that nourishes men deeply. A morning born of a bitter taste. The milk of manhood. Coffee is geography.

 

Mahmoud Darwish, from Memory for Forgetfulness. August, Beirut, 1982. Translated from the Arabic by Ibrahim Muhawi. Berkeley: U. of California Press, 1995, pp. 18-20. This is just one of the passages on coffee from this memoir by the great Palestinian poet, who died last year.

evenink

Water softeners, nickel, lead, $7,500 espresso machines, La Cimbali and the European Commission in Brussels. For what’s up with that, see here for the NYT article in today’s business section.

February

Some things that have been rattling around in February.

Zimbabwe Salimba AA. Maybe it’s called ‘Salimba estate.’  The thing is, what is ‘Salimba estate’? It turns out that it is really coffee from a certain region in the east of Zimbabwe. Obtaining information about where the beans come from is proving to be somewhat difficult. The beans seem to come from a lot of growers in the region who sell to some collective that mills the beans and puts them in bags with what is considered an attractive name. Especially given that this is Zimbabwe, it’s especially urgent to find out who owns the land, who’s worked it, etc. The latest BBC story on Zimbabwe is here. How is the coffee, you ask? Excellent! It’s really a very good balanced cup, with big flavor. I don’t have a Lot # or anything like that; Coffee Bean Corral would have that. If anyone reading this knows anything about Zimbabwe coffee, please write in.

Puerto Rico Yauco Selecto. Really who doesn’t like coffee from the Caribbean? What would that mean about said person? Maybe just that they had something lousy and decided to write it off forever. Anyway, the deal with this coffee is that it has a remarkable peanut-butter-like aroma and there’s something peanut buttery on the palate also. I’ve never experienced a flavor like that in coffee, although dry peanut aroma does pop up in some Brasilian coffees and sort of drift through the crema of an espresso. This is different though, this is a dense, chocolatey thing. There are some baggy hints which is a drag but they’re not really all that noticeable. That goes away altogether in a blend with this smokin Oaxaca decaf that I’ve been hoarding. The Oaxaca is from Sweet Maria’s. The PR, like the Zimbabwe mentioned above, is from Coffee Bean Corral.

visionaries

People who drink too much coffee could start seeing ghosts or hearing strange voices, UK research has suggested.  Read the story on the BBC website here.

after (see post of 11.29)

Just in time for Santa’s binge

The culprit: a less-than perfect wire-into-relay connection.

It’s surprising the roaster worked at all & a good thing it was caught when it was, considering the look of this singed plastic & metal panino.

We’re back “in business,” aiming to catch up to existing orders, thanks for your patience, thanks also to Gene Wrabel, whose hand is in the photo.

stoppage time

The reason for the larger circles than usual around the eyes is the continuing debacle of the roaster.

The HR-1 won’t cool down. The switch was replaced, but it appears that the problem wasn’t in the switch after all. Until further notice, we’re outta biznes here…

before: two months ago…(after coming soon)

Punks

Clay had some fun experimenting with my atomic/biohazard blend, the Pacamara from Finca El Injerto in Guatemala plus Menno’s Misty Valley in Ethiopia plus organic Colombia Cauca Tierradentro, all of which came via sweetmaria’s. I like his write-up, not surprising since he has a fully enjoyable blog over there, located somewhere near the coffee laboratory. My thoughts on that blend were just about the same – it was a bit too over the top, treble notes, sort of pinging in my consciousness like a choir of…well, forget that, it was just a bit smartass or something. But when it cools down a bit, that cup does in fact chill out and its complexity comes to the fore (this is as a cone drip-filter cup) it reminds me of something that, made super strong with ice cubes and sugar, could be a killer iced coffee. The problem is, it seems that it’s about to snow…