Coffee is synonymous with The Hindu!

A very special brew indeed, my morning cup of cheer!

I have a new protocol, even more stringent than it earlier was.

1. Buy Krishna coffee in Kingsway (i.e. ask for freshly-roasted peaberry with 10% chicory in multiples of 200gms). Chicory more than this is just not acceptable. Store the brown paper coffee packets wrapped up in a polythene bag at -20 deg Cand use one packet at a time. This preserves the flavours of coffee.

2. Put decoction the previous night using the steel coffee-filter. Add 5-7 heaped teaspoons of the ground coffee powder into the upper column and press it with the steel press.

3. Pour boiling hot water from a height, as far as the arm can go up, over the steel press to fill it to the brim and position it even if it scalds your finger. Cover with the steel lid but not completely, as this can create a vacuum. Gently tap with the lid, tak, tak, if the first drops take long to exit into the lower collection chamber.

4. Ask me for that cup of cheer :), that requires a delicate mixing of the decoction, milk and veneer.

No more steel tumblers, except for her - she prefers a kutti steel glass. Of late, she converted to coffee; such is the irresistible aroma when I make it just right with all that aathufying to get that froth without the davara-glass! The Mug-Vaal pathiram aathufying is probably as far apart as my arms can get and with that extra dash of sugar for myself, my morning is Bindaaz with this first cup making my 5-km walking in Kakatiyanagar all the more enjoyable!

This coffee-drinking habit is a sharp contrast to my Hyderabadi culture that I nurture despite being raised as a Tam-Brahm, speaking Hyderabadi-Tamizh or as she puts it, Koti-bashai, in the gullies of Sultan Bazar where I grew up and imbibed my Dad's habit of reading The Hindu.  For a while, I would even distribute the newspaper.

Reading The Hindu, my Bible, also has a protocol. 

Look for a vantage seat in the living room with sunlight streaming down your back. Pick up the newspaper on the left hand - and 2nd cup of frothy Dikashan-Kapi, in a white mug, on the right hand and read on.... 

I give full credit to what I am today to my daily 'Bible'.

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