{"id":2199,"date":"2014-09-05T12:40:29","date_gmt":"2014-09-05T12:40:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/?p=2199"},"modified":"2014-09-05T12:40:29","modified_gmt":"2014-09-05T12:40:29","slug":"on-the-hunt-for-american-coffee-in-israel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/on-the-hunt-for-american-coffee-in-israel\/","title":{"rendered":"On the Hunt for American Coffee in Israel"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Nicole Sivan
\n\"Coffee\"<\/a>
\nTaking a cue from their European neighbors, most Israelis practice their coffee culture more rigorously than their religion.\u00a0\u00a0 Coffee drinking in Israel is a leisurely affair and only an inexperienced and untrained waiter would dare rush you out of the caf\u00e9 when enjoying a cup of Joe.\u00a0 Sit, sip, and relax.\u00a0 Every hour is coffee hour in Israel.
\nWhen cruising down the streets in cities like Tel Aviv and Jerusalem, you will notice that every caf\u00e9 is full of patrons calmly drinking coffee (not wine, but coffee), Israel only mimics Europe to a certain extent.\u00a0 Doesn\u2019t anybody work, you may wonder?\u00a0 Yes, but coffee breaks, coffee meetings, and coffee social events are a perfectly acceptable part of a normal work day.<\/p>\n

You may already know from your own adventures in life that part of traveling to a new country is embracing the cuisine of the native land. The same goes for coffee.\u00a0 When in Israel, don\u2019t expect to wake up to Folgers in the morning. You will quickly discover that an American cup of coffee is not easy to find here, as Israelis generally consider our brew and drip connection as coffee flavored water. No caf\u00e9 would dare demean itself by offering such a diluted coffee beverage.<\/p>\n

For the first few years I lived in Israel, I desperately searched high and low in Israeli cafes for American-style coffee.\u00a0 I tried ordering anything on the menu that sounded close enough.\u00a0\u00a0 Each time I learned the hard way that \u201cclose enough\u201d is really far away.\u00a0 It\u2019s best to just let go of your coffee expectations and dive into the local coffee offerings.\u00a0 One time, desperate for a caffeine fix, I walked into a caf\u00e9 and ordered a black coffee, caf\u00e9 shahor, thinking \u201cgreat, coffee without milk.\u00a0 I can just add my own.\u00a0 No problem.\u201d\u00a0 The joke was on me though.\u00a0 Black coffee in Israel is another name for Turkish coffee, which is finely ground coffee beans scooped directly into your coffee cup.\u00a0 Poor boiling water on top of the grounds and mix.\u00a0 What emerges is a very strong cup of coffee.\u00a0 The coffee grinds in this type of coffee sink to the bottom of your cup creating a murky mess at the end.\u00a0 For this reason, Israelis often refer to this type of coffee as \u201cmud coffee.\u201d<\/p>\n

I have actually become a fan of Turkish coffee and even drink this brew when outside of Israel.\u00a0 However, to the horror of native-born Israelis, I Americanize the coffee.\u00a0 While a true Israeli will drink Turkish coffee in a small clear water glass (no handle), yes that is right, glass not ceramic, I scoop my coffee into a large American-style coffee cup, poor boiling water three quarters of the way up, and then add cold milk.\u00a0 I think this creates a super strong cup of American-style coffee.\u00a0 I like it a lot.<\/p>\n

But, for those of you who desperately must start the day with a true American coffee there are a couple of options.\u00a0 Hotels and other tourist locations may offer \u2018caf\u00e9 filter\u2019 which is a round tea-like bag, filled with coffee grounds.\u00a0 Place this bag in the provided plastic drip cup and position it over your coffee cup.\u00a0 Poor in hot water through the plastic filter and coffee will drip through into your cup.\u00a0 This type of coffee is generally very stale, lacks any real flavor, and somehow is missing that alluring coffee smell. After all, who knows when the coffee in the sack was ground? It could be years old.\u00a0 I recommend taking a pass on this coffee option.<\/p>\n

A better solution would be to order Caf\u00e9 Americano.\u00a0 Although the name seems obvious, I didn\u2019t discover this coffee selection until I had lived in Israel for over six years.\u00a0 Caf\u00e9 Americano is basically an espresso brewed in a full size coffee cup.\u00a0 Hot water is then added to the espresso to dilute its strength and create a full cup of coffee.\u00a0 Once you enjoy a fresh cup of this style coffee–beans freshly ground and brewed on the spot just for you,–you will never again be able to enjoy a boring cup of Starbucks coffee again.\u00a0 And, as I said, Israelis, like the Italians and the French, enjoy a real cup of coffee, espresso, or cappuccino. Starbucks is just not a viable option here in Israel.<\/p>\n

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By Nicole Sivan Taking a cue from their European neighbors, most Israelis practice their coffee culture more rigorously than their religion.\u00a0\u00a0 Coffee drinking in Israel is a leisurely affair and only an inexperienced and untrained waiter would dare rush you out of the caf\u00e9 when enjoying a cup of Joe.\u00a0 Sit, sip, and relax.\u00a0 Every more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2200,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[136,28],"tags":[376,75,625,374,631,125,375],"class_list":{"0":"post-2199","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-israeli-culture","8":"category-israeli-life-culture","9":"tag-coffee","10":"tag-israel","11":"tag-israeli-news","12":"tag-israeli-coffee-culture","13":"tag-israeli-life","14":"tag-news-from-jerusalem","15":"tag-starbucks","16":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2199"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2201,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2199\/revisions\/2201"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2200"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2199"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2199"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thejerusalemgiftshop.com\/israelnews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2199"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}