History of the Civil War

Confederate Coffee

Part Two

(Don't try this at home)

reprinted from various Southern newspapers

contributed by Bob Brown

From the AUSTIN STATE GAZETTE [TEX.], Nov. 9, 1861, p. 4, c. 2

Save your okra seeds. Okra is the best substitute for coffee that is known. Besides this, the okra plant will kill out noxious weeds, even coco, better than any other known means. The okra plant makes a shade so dense, that nothing will grow in it. Gardens that have been allowed to go to the weeds have in this way been cleared of them. Fields may be in the same way. An acre of okra will produce seed enough to furnish a plantation of fifty negroes with coffee in every way equal to that imported from Rio. The green pods taken from an acre of okra and dried, would furnish the best thickening for soup in the winter, that could be made. Okra is the most valuable plant that is raised. Save your okra seeds.--Telegraph.

From the CHARLESTON MERCURY [SC], October 5, 1861, p. 1, c. 6

An Excellent Substitute for Coffee.--For a family of seven or eight persons, take a pint of well toasted corn meal, and add to it as much water as an ordinary sized coffee pot will hold, and then boil it well. We have tried this toasted meal _coffee_, and prefer it to Java or Rio, in as much as genuine coffee does not suit our digestive organs, and we have not used it for years. Many persons cannot drink coffee with impunity, and we advise all such to try our receipt. They will find it more nutritious than coffee and quite as palatable.--Raleigh Register.

From the MEMPHIS DAILY APPEAL [JACKSON, MS], January 20, 1863, p. 1, c. 2

One of our exchanges publishes a new recipe for making coffee, which we recommend to the steward of our boarding house. Take coffee grains and pop corn of each an equal quantity. Roast the same together. The corn will hop out, and what remains will be unadulterated coffee.

From the MOBILE REGISTER AND ADVERTISER [AL], October 9, 1861, p. 2, c. 3

An Excellent Substitute for Coffee.--For a family of seven or eight persons, take a pint of well toasted corn meal, and add to it as much water as an ordinary sized coffee-pot will hold, and then boil it well. We have tried this toasted meal _coffee_, and prefer it to Java or Rio, inasmuch as genuine coffee does not suit our digestive organs, and we have not used it for years. Many persons cannot drink coffee with impunity, and we advise all such to try our receipt. They will find it more nutritious than coffee and quite as palatable.--[Raleigh Register.

From the NATCHEZ DAILY COURIER [MS], Sept. 21, 1861, p. 1, c. 3

Asparagus for Coffee.

[From the Annual of Scientific Discovery]

'Liebig states that Asparagus, contains, in common with Tea and Coffee, a principle which he calls Taurine, and which he considers essential to the health of those who do not take strong exercise. By this, a writer in the London _Gardener's Chronicle_ was led to test Asparagus as a substitute for Coffee. He says: The young shoots were not agreeable, having an alkaline taste. I then tried ripe seeds, and they, roasted and ground, made a full flavored Coffee, not easily distinguished from fine Mocha. The seeds are easily freed from the berries by drying them in a cool [warm, I suppose he means,] oven, and then rubbing them on a sieve.'

'There is in Berlin, Prussia, a large establishment for the manufacture of coffee from acorns and Chicory, the articles being made separately. The Chicory is mixed with an equal weight of turnips, to render it sweeter. The Acorn Coffee, which is made from roasted and ground Acorns, is sold in large quantities, and frequently with rather a medicinal than an economical view, as it is thought to have a wholesome effect upon the blood. Acorn Coffee is, however, made and used in many parts of Germany for sole purpose of adulterating genuine Coffee.

From the NATCHEZ DAILY COURIER [MS], October 18, 1861, p. 1, c. 5

A Light Matter. The days get shorter, daylight is becoming scarcer, and candles dearer. Coal oil is said to be where coffee is--out of sight. The substitute for coffee is rye, the substitute for coal oil is a black cat, which when rubbed strongly on a frosty night will shine.

From the NATCHEZ DAILY COURIER [MS], October 30, 1861, p. 1, c. 5

Substitute for Coffee. We are requested to recommend Field Peas, dried, parched, and ground, as an excellent substitute for Coffee, said to be better than wheat or rye.--Fayetteville Observer.

From the NATCHEZ DAILY COURIER [MS], November 5, 1861, p. 1, c. 2

The Best Coffee - From the Mobile Daily Tribune.

In times of famine, occasioned by the total loss of a crop, by scarcity, the protracted operation of a siege, or by a blockade such as now prevails, while food is diminished and dear, efforts are usually made to substitute for articles of prime necessity others that approximate most nearly to them in their taste and general sanitary effects. Under circumstances it pertains to all enlightened and practical hygienic systems to select for the purpose of such experiments, those substances which are most wholesome. At the South, several substitutes for coffee have been resorted to. Neither of them is unwholesome; but, at the same time, neither is designed to produce salutary results. By roasting corn, wheat, oats, or potatoes a considerable consumption of genuine coffee is certainly economized, the latter being used by in such quantity as is necessary to flavor. Now, if in adhering to the small quantity employed for imparting taste to the decoction, the roasted acorn shall be adopted, the problem is solved.

The acorn of our native oak (Quercus Alba) is found in great abundance from Canada to Florida. This species approaches nearest to the fruit bearing oak (Quercus Hispanica) which is palatable, raw or cooked and which constitutes an important element of traffic in Old Castile. If the reader will carefully note the analysis given of it by Lorvig, the chemist, he will be convinced that it contains such substances as are, at once, most nutricious [sic] and medicinal; Greasy oil, rosin, gum, tannin, or bitter extract, starch and the remainder potash and calcium salts.

Acorns supplied the food of man before wheat was discovered. In France, during the scarcity of 1709, the indigent were compelled to have recourse to this resource for them, the only one. Pulverized into flour, they made use of it for bread; and, under the first consulate, upon the establishment of the continental system, some industrial economists conceived the idea of substituting the roasted acorn for coffee, and styled it "indigenous coffee."

In 1840, while I was stationed in the Grecian Archipelago, I visited from time to time the principal islands--Samos, Scio, Imbros, etc. The Greeks who inhabit those countries have recourse to acorn coffee in the slightest affections of the stomach or intestines; and I have seen subjects suffering from chronic dyspepsia, or diarrhea, cured in less than four or five days.

The reader may assure himself of the correctness of my statement by opening any standard work on materia medica; and he will learn that acorn coffee is a tonic proscribed in scrofula, debility of the digestive organs, and recommended as a substitute for coffee to nervous persons. If, therefore, the blockade should continue, and the importation of coffee is rendered impracticable, it would be very natural that the use of acorn coffee, mixed with the genuine should become universal. The poor would find it equally a source of economy and a valuable remedy; and soldiers in camp would be less exposed to diarrhea, one of the most terrible evils that can exist in an army.

In order to prepare this coffee, the acorns must be first roasted in an oven. The hard outer shell is removed, and the kernel is preserved, which, after being roasted, is ground with ordinary coffee. A. Poiteven, M. D.

From the NATCHEZ DAILY COURIER [MS], February 7, 1862, p. 1, c. 5

Cotton Seed Coffee. We have been favored by a friend, with a sample of Cotton Seed Coffee prepared by Dr. H. Ravenel, of Poosilee, St. John's Berkley, which we had served up at breakfast yesterday morning, and found very palatable. The Cotton Seed is parched, and ground or powdered, as if it were the Coffee bean, and prepared for use accordingly. The aroma is very like that of Coffee, but rather more like that of Brom [?]. We have little doubt that a mixture of one-third or one-half Coffee, and the rest of ground or powdered Cotton Seed, would easily pass for good, if not pure, Coffee.

We have also tried Rye alone, and in mixture with one-third Coffee, and found both preparations good substitutes for the aromatic bean.--Charleston Courier.

(Editors note: Well there you have it. The story of Confederate coffee. I hope you enjoyed the two part series. Being a coffee lover myself I found it interesting)