Turkish and Greek Coffee

 (image from Wikipedia)

Those countries like their coffee strong!  And I recommend a little sugar if you are unused to stronger coffee.  But what puts most people off is the texture.  It's......thick.  My husband calls it coffee sludge if that helps any, and near the bottom it's gritty (and most leave it there).  

Greek coffee and Turkish coffee are pretty much the same.  Basically the coffee beans are ground super fine (finer than even espresso).  Sometimes this is done with a mortar and pestle.  Then the coffee grounds are quickly boiled with water. From wikipedia:

"The amount of cold water necessary can be measured in the number of demitasse cups desired (approximately 3 ounces or 90 ml) with between one and two heaped teaspoons of coffee being used per cup. The coffee and sugar are usually added to the water rather than being put into the pot first."

I can tell you that it was recommended to us in Greece to do sugar.  We sat in a little bar and ordered the coffee and got smirks.  But we drank that right up!  There is a foam on top that is fairly smooth, and if the coffee is cooked too long it doesn't have foam.  

I'm lucky that living where I do, it's easy to find this sort of coffee.  But I do encourage you to search it out!  It's an experience for certain.  While in Greece we drank it, and in Turkey when we weren't drinking fruity tea offered to us on trays we were drinking turkish coffee (or nescafe, another popular thing).  It's different, it takes some getting used to, but if you thought espresso gave you a shot of caffeine....watch out!  This coffee takes the cake on caffeine highs.