More Israeli Coffee "Experiments"

After reading of my great disappointment in the coffee I had bought a few weeks ago in Machane Yehuda, somebody bought me ground coffee in a different store there. According to her, it had been ground specifically for a French Press, which is the coarsest the grinders can do.

It smelled good, so I was very optimistic about having a nice strong cup of coffee. But when I opened the package, I saw that it was much too powdery for my French Press plunger/filter. But a gift is a gift, and I wanted to see how much a coffee maven I really am.

I'm not quite sure how to pronounce the name of the store, but it's something like Bashkowitz, 32 Eitz Chaim Street, Machane Yehuda, Jerusalem.

Since the coffee had been bought for use in a French Press, that's what I tried first:

I was disappointed in the taste of the coffee, which was very similar to the inexpensive Elite Turkish I can buy anyplace. That's my default coffee, which I perk, or sometimes filter, when I don't have any other coffee.  And even though the plunger didn't get stuck as it would with the Turkish, I still had "mud" on the bottom of my mug, which is a characteristic of Turkish coffee. It doesn't happen when the coffee beans are ground coarsely enough.

Today I decided to try it with my low-tech coffee filter. That is fine enough even to keep Turkish coffee out of the mug.

With the filter, I use two mugs, so the second can get more coffee dripping, while I'm drinking from the first and visa-versa if I'm having a lot of coffee.

For some strange reason, this coffee didn't filter all that well. I even had to "jiggle" the filter parts for all of the water to go down. That's a sign that the coffee is too powdery.

And as you can see from the photo on the bottom, the coffee is pretty weak. Considering that these experiments were done just before Yom Kippur, and many people advise to cut down on coffee/caffeine before a 25 hour fast, I didn't mind all that much that I was drinking weak, wimpy coffee.

I'll perk what's left after the fast. My percolator has been pretty good at getting the best out of pretty much any coffee, as long as it's real coffee...

Tzom Kal, have an easy fast if you're fasting this Yom Kippur.