SECTION XVI.. Coffee As a Beverage.

COFFEE AS A BEVERAGE.

It is remarkable that, much as coffee is used in this country, the proper mode of preparing it as a beverage should be so little understood. Perhaps it is that most people consider coffee-making as too easy a process to need any pains at all; and for this reason the coffee served at nine breakfast-tables out of ten, throughout the kingdom, is a miserable muddy infusion, which people seem to drink only because, as washerwomen say, it is “wet and warm.” The right way of making coffee is not less easy than the wrong one; there is no mystery about it. All that is required is the observance of a few simple rules:

1. The nature of coffee is such that it parts very easily with its aromatic, stimulating, and other properties; a small quantity of water will draw out all the goodness quite as effectually as a large quantity, and it will do this if the coffee-berries be only bruised or very coarsely ground. It is a grave mistake to suppose that coffee should be ground to a fine powder; extreme fineness is the great cause of “thick coffee” as prepared for breakfast. In Eastern countries, where people know what good coffee means, they always bruise the berries in a mortar. In fact, the goodness of coffee depends more on the roasting and the method of preparing afterwards, than on the quality of the berry, or any other particular.

2. Buy your coffee ready roasted, but not ground; that is, buy coffee-berries, and always choose such as are fresh roasted, in preference to stale. Observe, also, whether your grocer keeps the article properly shut up in tin canisters, or lets it lie about in open tubs or trays.

3. If possible, buy a coffee-mill, one that will grind very coarsely. The price varies from 2s. 6d. to 5s. This article is so essential to a good cup of coffee, that no one who can afford the outlay should hesitate to buy one. Those who have a pestle and mortar may try the method of bruising; but whether a mill or a mortar, no more should be ground or crushed than is wanted for use at the time.

4. Coffee requires to be kept in a very dry place; and, as it readily takes up the flavour of other articles near which it may be placed, it should be kept in an air-tight vessel. If you buy tea and coffee at the same time, do not pack them in one parcel or basket, or carry them in the same packet, for the true flavour of both will be injured. We presume that no one will be so careless as to keep either tea or coffee in paper only; a wooden box would be better than this, but a bottle or porcelain jar is best of all.

5. Have a clean, dry coffee-pot; it should always be rinsed out when put away, and turned down to drain.

6. To every half pint of water, allow half an ounce of coffee-powder; have your kettle of water boiling, put the necessary quantity of powder into the coffee-pot, and pour in as much water from the kettle as you require. Set the pot on the fire for a few seconds, but on no account let the contents boil up; then pour about half a pint of the liquor into a cup, and pour it back again into the pot, and stand it on the hob or on the fender to settle. If these directions have been properly followed, there will be in three or four minutes a pot of coffee as clear and well-tasted as any one could wish to drink. Should it be too strong, you have only to use less of the coffee-powder. All the goodness is extracted with the first boiling; and those who wish to drink good coffee must never boil the same grounds a second time.

7. The milk in all cases must be warmed, and used as hot as possible; and it should always be put into the cup with the sugar before the coffee is poured in. When a cup of coffee is taken after dinner, it should be drank without milk, and with little or no sugar.

8. But of all the preparations of coffee there is none equal to the French, known as café au lait, or milk coffee. We have drank it constantly for several years, and can pronounce it to excel all others as a breakfast beverage. In this there is more milk than water, and the coffee liquor is rather an essence than a decoction; it will be almost black in colour. The process to be followed is the same in most respects as described; but, instead of a quart or three pints, not more than a third of your usual quantity of water is to be poured on the full quantity of coffee-powder. After it has stood to settle, pour it carefully off the grounds into a jug or pitcher, which is to be kept hot by any convenient means. In this way the liquor, though black, will be perfectly clear. At the same time a quantity of milk, according to the wants of your party, must be heated in a saucepan with a spout or a lip. When this is ready, pour it into your breakfast-cups until they are three-parts full, or rather more, add the sugar, and then fill up with coffee from the jug, more or less, according as you prefer it strong or weak. Coffee made in this way will be found more nutritious, and to possess greater richness and smoothness, than can be attained by any other means.

Many persons are in the habit of keeping roasted coffee in vessels of tin, closely secured; this is a most improper mode, and the consequences of doing so may be pointed out. It is known that coffee contains gallic acid, a principle which has the property of acting on iron or tin, and it is therefore certain that in keeping coffee in these canisters the acid has such an effect in dissolving particles of the metal, as not only to affect the taste, but even the colour of the coffee. To convince one’s self of this, it is only necessary to leave some freshly-roasted coffee in a tinned vessel for a time, and it will soon be found to have imbibed a black colour and a most disagreeable taste.

It appears, therefore, to be necessary to avoid keeping coffee in these metal receptacles. The best mode of properly preserving the article is by using vessels of porcelain, or other similar material. With regard to the description of coffee-pot to be used in preparing the article, it should never be of tin or iron; nothing will so soon and so surely destroy the fine flavour of the beverage as these descriptions of coffee-pots. It has generally been the practice to make coffee either by boiling it, or by pouring boiling water on the ground coffee placed on a filter. Both of these methods are bad.

Experience has shown that boiling water destroys or sensibly alters the volatile parts of the berry, and dissolves those which are bitter and unpleasant. We ought not, therefore, to employ water heated to a greater temperature than to allow the finger being placed in it. But difficult as it may be to believe, there can be no doubt but that the best mode of preparing this beverage is with cold water. Coffee so made is not only more aromatic, more limpid, and more substantial, but it is far stronger than any made with hot water. The cold infusion takes from the coffee and communicates to the water all its aromatic qualities, while it does not imbibe much, if any, of the gallic acid; consequently this preparation is far less bitter than that which has been boiled, in which process the most minute particles are acted upon.

Coffee thus made is of a fine bright and dark colour; it requires far less sugar and much less care, because all that has to be done is to place the powder on the filter, drop on it a little water, and when well moistened to pour on it the proper quantity of water. The filtration will be completed in a moderately short space of time, and the liquor having run through, may be again poured on the coffee, so as to remove any further portion of flavour left in it; and when this has been done, the preparation will be so delicate and aromatic that those who taste it will adopt the mode in preference to any other. When the coffee thus made is to be warmed for use, it must not be heated to the boiling point, and take care that the vessel in which it is warmed be quite full. It may be here remarked that coffee thus made warm is always more pleasant than when drank at the time of its preparation, provided it be not made to boil, and that the coffee-pot be well closed. It is equally necessary with the above that the berry should be well and thoroughly roasted, and not ground in a mill or machine, but pounded and sifted, so as to secure the particles being of equal fineness.

To enter into an examination of the comparative merits and demerits of the several percolators and cafetières at present in use, would extend these observations to too great a length; but most of those generally adopted are worthless, or complicated, with the abominable bag-filter, which is seldom kept clean. There is ample room for inventors in the manufacture of a simple coffee-pot with a water-gauge at the side, which shall effect what is not now done--a passage of the hot water once only through the coffee, so as to have a bright infusion instead of a muddy decoction.

“Tea,” observes Dr. Sigmond, “as the morning beverage, when breakfast forms a good substantial meal, upon which the powers for the day of meeting the various chances and changes of life depend, provided it be not strong, is much to be recommended; but when individuals eat little, coffee certainly supports them in a more decided manner; and, besides this, tea without a certain quantity of solid aliment, is much more likely to influence the nervous system. Some persons, if they drink tea in the morning and coffee at night, suffer much in animal spirits and in power of enjoyment of the pleasure of society; but if they reverse the system, and take coffee in the morning and tea at night, they reap benefit from the change; for the coffee, which to them in the morning is nutrition, becomes a stimulus at night; and the tea, which acts as a dilutent at night, gives nothing for support during the day.”

The Turks drink their coffee very hot and strong, and without sugar; occasionally they put in, when boiling, a clove or two bruised, or a few seeds of star anise, or a drop of essence of amber.

The following quotations from recent travellers give the Turkish mode of making coffee:

“The bruised or ground beans are thrown into a small brass or copper saucepan; sufficient water, scalding hot, is poured upon them, and, after being allowed to simmer for a few seconds, the liquid is poured into small cups, without refining or straining. Persons unaccustomed to this way of making coffee find it unpalatable. Those who have overcome the first introduction prefer it to that made after the French fashion, whereby the aroma is lost or deteriorated. A well made cup of good Turkish coffee is indeed the most delectable beverage, that can be well imagined, being grateful to the senses and refreshingly stimulant to the nerves. Those who have long resided in the East can alone estimate its merits.”--WHITE’S Three Years in Constantinople.

“The Turkish way of making coffee produces a very different result from that to which we are accustomed. A small conical saucepan, with a long handle, and calculated to hold about two table-spoonfuls of water, is the instrument used. The fresh roasted berry is pounded, not ground, and about a dessert-spoonful is put into the minute boiler; it is then nearly filled with water, and thrust among the embers; a few seconds suffice to make it boil, and the decoction, grounds and all, is poured into a small cup, which fits into a brass socket much like the cup of an acorn, and holding the china cup as that does the acorn itself. The Turks seem to drink this decoction boiling, and swallow the grounds with the liquid. We allow it to remain a minute, in order to leave the sediment at the bottom. It is always taken plain; sugar or cream would be thought to spoil it; and Europeans, after a little practice (longer, however, than we had), are said to prefer it to the clear infusion drunk in France. In every hut you will see these coffee-boilers suspended, and the means for pounding the roasted berry will be found at hand.”--CHRISTMAS’S Shores and Islands of the Mediterranean.

“A small vessel, containing about a wine-glass of water, is placed on the fire, and, when boiling, a teaspoonful of ground coffee is put into it, stirred up, and it is suffered to boil and ‘bubble’ a few seconds longer, when it is poured (grounds and all) into a cup about the size of an egg-shell, encased in gold or silver filigree-work, to protect the finger from the heat; and the liquid, in its scalding, black, thick, and troubled state, is imbibed with the greatest relish. Like smoking, it must be quite an acquired taste.”--MAXWELL’S Shores of the Mediterranean.

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