<!--thumb|Kaapi served in a metal tumbler, inside the dabarah saucer in which it can be cooled-->
Indian filter coffee is a coffee drink made by mixing hot milk and sugar with the infusion obtained by percolation brewing of finely ground coffee powder with chicory in a traditional Indian filter. It has been described as "hot, strong, sweet and topped with bubbly froth" and is known as filter kaapi in India.
History
thumb|right|Coffee grinding in a filter coffee shop in [[Chennai]]
The consumption of coffee was recorded in the art and accounts of the Mughal court, from the early 1600s, with travellers offering accounts of the qahwakhanas (coffeehouses) of Shahjahanabad (Old Delhi).
Until the 17th century, efforts were made to establish and maintain an Arabian coffee monopoly, with cultivation limited to Ethiopia, Tanzania, and Yemen, and exports limited to roasted or baked coffee beans, to protect the Arabian merchants. According to a legend, Indian Sufi Baba Budan discovered coffee on a pilgrimage to Mecca, and smuggled seven raw coffee beans back to India and planted them in the hills of Chikmagalur in present-day Karnataka. The favourable conditions enabled the coffee plants to thrive in the hills, which were later named Baba Budangiri ('Baba Budan Hills').
In the mid to late 1600s, the Dutch East India Company (1605-1825) were the first to recognise the commercial opportunities of exporting Indian grown coffee, but later concentrated their efforts in Java. They also noted its popularity among the locals, a Dutch chaplain, Rev Jacob Vissche, of Cochin, wrote in the 1720s: "The coffee shrub is planted in the gardens for pleasure and yields plenty of fruit which attains a proper degree of ripeness. But it has not the refined taste of the Mocha coffee ...". or Peaberry coffee beans. The beans are dark roasted, ground, and blended with chicory, with the coffee constituting 80-90% and the chicory 10-20% of the mixture. The chicory's slight bitterness contributes to the flavor of Indian filter coffee. A cylindrical, stainless steel filter is used in the preparation of the drip coffee. The filter has two metal cups that assemble one over the other. The filter coffee powder is first added to the upper cup on top of the perforated chamber and then compressed with a pressing disc. The boiled water is then poured over the disc and filter.