Cardamom Coffee Recipe: Filter Coffee and Arabic Qahwa

The easiest cardamom coffee is South Indian filter coffee with the crushed seeds of one cardamom pod mixed into the coffee powder before brewing, enough for two cups. For a stronger, milk-free version, make Arabic-style qahwa: light-roast coffee simmered in water, then steeped with about a teaspoon of freshly crushed cardamom seeds.

Which version should you make?

Recipe 1: filter coffee with cardamom

Ingredients (2 cups)

• 2 heaped tablespoons filter coffee powder
• 1 green cardamom pod, seeds only, lightly crushed
• ½ cup just-boiled water
• 1½ cups milk
• Sugar to taste

Method

1. Split the pod, tip out the seeds and crush them with the back of a spoon. Our guide to peeling cardamom seeds has a quick way to do this.
2. Mix the crushed seeds into the coffee powder in the top chamber of the filter. Press it down lightly with the plunger.
3. Pour in the hot water, cover, and let it drip for 10 to 15 minutes.
4. Heat the milk until it just starts to rise. For each cup, mix 2 to 3 tablespoons of decoction with hot milk and sugar.
5. Pour between two tumblers a few times to froth it, and serve straight away.

No filter? Simmer the coffee powder and cardamom in the water for 2 minutes, rest it for 5 minutes to settle, then strain through a fine cloth or paper. Our post on making filter coffee without a filter explains the method in detail.

Recipe 2: Arabic-style cardamom coffee (qahwa)

Qahwa is the coffee served across the Arabian Gulf: light in colour, no milk, strongly scented with cardamom and poured in small cups.

Ingredients (4 small cups)

• 2 cups water
• 2 tablespoons lightly roasted ground coffee
• 1 teaspoon cardamom seeds, freshly crushed (from about 10 pods)
• Optional: 3 or 4 saffron strands, or 1 clove

Method

1. Bring the water to a boil. Add the coffee and simmer gently for 10 minutes.
2. Turn off the heat. Add the cardamom (and saffron or clove, if using). Cover and steep for 5 minutes.
3. Let the grounds settle for a minute, then pour slowly into small cups, leaving the sediment behind.
4. Serve with dates rather than sugar.

A note on the coffee: qahwa is traditionally made with lightly roasted beans. Dark-roast South Indian filter coffee will work, but the result is darker and more bitter. If that's all you have, use a little less coffee and simmer for 5 minutes instead of 10.

What goes wrong

• Using old cardamom powder. Coffee's strong smell drowns weak cardamom. Always crush seeds fresh.
• Too much cardamom in filter coffee. More than one pod per two cups starts to taste like a sweet, not a coffee.
• Boiling the cardamom in qahwa. Add it off the heat so its aroma doesn't boil away.
• Grinding cardamom with the husk for filter coffee. Husk bits can clog the filter holes. Use seeds only.

Does the type of coffee matter?

For the milky filter version, a strong coffee holds up best against the milk. Robusta gives more body and bitterness. Arabica is smoother and more aromatic. We compare the two in Robusta vs Arabica for filter coffee.

For the filter version, our Naadan Kerala coffee is a Wayanad Robusta blended with a little chicory, the way filter coffee is made in most South Indian hotels. If you're after coffee with no chicory at all, this isn't that. For either recipe, whole Idukki cardamom gives you seeds to crush fresh.