Louiza (لويزة)

Louiza speaks before you drink it. Rub one dried leaf between your fingers and the room turns lemony, green, clean, like a kitchen window opened after dinner. This is not the tea of ceremony, poured high with mint. It's the softer glass, the one handed to someone who ate too much, slept badly, or needs the house to lower its voice.

Treat the leaves gently. Boil the water, then let it pause for a breath before it meets the louiza. Cover the pot while it steeps, because the perfume is the medicine and the pleasure; leave it open and half of what you came for escapes into the air. The infusion should be pale gold, not harsh, not cooked to death.

Sweeten lightly, or don't. In some houses there is sugar, in others honey, and in others nothing at all because the leaf carries its own kindness. Pour it in small glasses and make one more than you counted. Une table, c'est une porte qu'on laisse ouverte, a table is a door you leave open, even when all you're serving is calm.