Friedrich Christian Accum

The beverage which we call coffee, is said to have been drank in Ethiopia from time immemorial. The Galla, a wandering nation of Africa, in their excursions on Abyssinia, being obliged to traverse immense deserts, and being also desirous of falling on the Abyssinians, without warning, that they may be incumbered as little as possible with baggage, carry nothing with them to eat, but coffee roasted, till it can be pulverised, and then mixed with butter into balls; one of these, about the size of a billiard ball, is said to keep them during a whole day’s fatigue.[39]

[39] Bruce’s Abyss. II. 226.

The liquor, called coffee, was introduced into Adea, in Arabia, from Persia, about the middle of the 15th century. Not long after it reached Mecca, Medina, &c. and Grand Cairo. Hence it continued its progress to Damascus and Aleppo, and in 1554 became known at Constantinople.

It is not certain at what time the use of coffee passed from Constantinople to the Western part of Europe. Thevenot, a French traveller into the East, at his return in 1657, brought with him coffee to Paris. In the year 1671, a coffee-house was opened at Marseilles. Soon after coffee-rooms were opened at Paris.

The first mention of coffee in our statute books was 1660. In the year 1688, Mr. Ray affirms, that London might rival Grand Cairo in the number of its coffee-houses.[40]

NATURAL HISTORY OF THE COFFEE TREE.

The tree which produces coffee contains ten species, chiefly natives of the East Indies, South America, and the Polynesian isles. The only species, however, that we have to notice in the present work is the coffee Arabica, of which there are two varieties, though both are sold in our shops as Turkey coffee, and possess similar qualities.

The tree seldom rises more than 16 or 18 feet high, with an erect main stem, covered with a lightish brown bark: the leaves are oblong-ovate, and pointed; the flowers are set in clusters; they are of a pure white, and possess a very pleasant odour, but their duration is very transient. The fruit resembles a cherry, and grows in clusters, ranged along the branches under the axillÆ of the leaves, which are of a laurel hue, but rather longer than a laurel leaf. It is an ever-green, and makes a beautiful appearance at every season in the year, but particularly when it is in flower.

The coffee tree has of late years been much cultivated in America, but the coffee which has been thence brought to Europe has been very little esteemed. This great difference in the goodness many have attributed to the soil in which it grows, and therefore have supposed it impossible for the inhabitants of the British islands ever to cultivate this commodity to any real advantage; but this is certainly a mistake, as is affirmed by several persons of credit, who have resided abroad, who say, that the berries which they have gathered from the trees and roasted themselves, were as well flavoured as any of the coffee brought from Mocha; so that the fault is in the drying, and bringing over; for if in the drying of the berries they be laid in rooms near the sugar-works, or near the house where rum is distilled, the berries soon imbibe the surrounding effluvia, which will greatly alter their flavour. In like manner the coffee brought in the same ships with rum and sugar, were the coffee ever so good, would hereby be entirely altered.

Raw coffee materially becomes ameliorated by age. It should be kept in bags, or vessels permeable to air, and in a dry, or rather warm place.

BEST METHOD OF MAKING COFFEE.

The general use of tea among us, has caused the inhabitants of Great Britain to be in general far inferior than their neighbours on the continent in the art of preparing the beverage called coffee. The coloured water commonly drank in England under this name, is as much the object of derision to foreigners, as their soup maigre is to us; hence a lively French writer says, “The English do not care about the quality of coffee, if they can but get enough of it.” Coffee certainly is almost universally made stronger on the other side of the channel than it is here.

Count Rumford, in the eighteenth of his Essays has entered into a minute, elaborate, and useful analysis of the powers of coffee, and the best means of infusing it for dietetic purposes. He remarks, that among the numerous luxuries of the table, unknown to our forefathers, coffee may be considered as one of the most valuable. Its taste is very agreeable, and its flavour uncommonly so; but its principal excellence depends on its salubrity, and on its exhilarating quality. It excites cheerfulness, without intoxication; and the pleasing flow of spirits which it occasions, lasts many hours, and is never followed by sadness, languor, or debility. It diffuses over the whole frame a glow of health, and a sense of ease and well-being which is extremely delightful: existence is felt to be a positive enjoyment, and the mental powers are awakened, and rendered uncommonly active. After some other judicious observations on the valuable properties of coffee, and the uncertainty of the result in the common methods of preparing it, the Count proceeds with his subject.

Different methods have been employed in making coffee; but the preparation of the grain is nearly the same in all of them. It is first roasted in an iron pan, or in a hollow cylinder made of sheet-iron, over a brisk fire; and when, from the colour of the grain, and the peculiar fragrance which it acquires in this process, it is judged to be sufficiently roasted, it is taken from the fire, and suffered to cool. When cold, it is ground in a mill to a coarse powder, and preserved for use.

Great care must be taken in roasting coffee, not to roast it too much; as soon as it has acquired a deep cinnamon colour, it should be taken from the fire, and cooled; otherwise, much of its aromatic flavour will be dissipated, and its taste becomes disagreeably bitter.

In order that coffee may be perfectly good, and very high flavoured, not more than half a pound of the grain should be roasted at once; for when the quantity is greater, it becomes impossible to regulate the heat in such a manner as to be quite certain of a good result.

The progress of the operation, and the moment most proper to put an end to it, may be judged and determined with great certainty, not only by the changes which take place in the colour of the grain, but also by the peculiar fragrance which will first begin to be diffused by it when it is nearly roasted enough.

If the coffee in powder is not well defended from the air, it soon loses its flavour, and becomes of little value; and the liquor is never in so high perfection as when the coffee is made immediately after the grain has been roasted.

Boiling-hot water extracts from coffee, which has been properly roasted and ground, an aromatic substance of an exquisite flavour, together with a considerable quantity of astringent matter, of a bitter but very agreeable taste; but this aromatic substance, which is supposed to be an oil, is extremely volatile, and is so feebly united to the water that it escapes from it into the air with great facility. If a cup of the very best coffee, prepared in the highest perfection, and boiling hot, be placed on a table, in the middle of a large room, and suffered to cool, it will in cooling fill the room with its fragrance; but the coffee, after having become cold, will be found to have lost a great deal of its flavour. If it be again heated, its taste and flavour will be still further impaired; and after it has been heated and cooled two or three times, it will be found to be quite vapid and disgusting. The fragrance diffused through the air is a sure indication that the coffee has lost some of its volatile parts; and as that liquor is found to have lost its peculiar flavour, and also its exhilarating quality, there can be no doubt but that both these depend on the preservation of those volatile particles which escape into the air with such facility.

In order that coffee may retain all those aromatic particles which give to that beverage its excellent qualities, nothing more is necessary than to prevent all internal motions among the particles of that liquid; by preventing its being exposed to any change of temperature, either during the time employed in preparing it or afterwards, till it is served up.

This may be done by pouring boiling water on the coffee in powder; and as all kinds of agitation is very detrimental to coffee, not only when made, but also while it is making, it is evident that the method formerly practised, that of putting the ground coffee into a coffee-pot with water, and boiling them together, must be very defective, and must occasion a very great loss. But that is not all, for the coffee which is prepared in that manner can never be good, whatever may be the quantity of ground coffee that is employed. The liquor may no doubt be very bitter, and it commonly is so; and it may possibly contain something that may irritate the nerves,—but the exquisite flavour and exhilarating qualities of good coffee will be wanting.

Coffee may easily be too bitter, but it is impossible that it should ever be too fragrant. The very smell of it is reviving, and has often been found to be useful to sick persons, and especially to those who are afflicted with violent head-aches. In short, every thing proves that the volatile aromatic matter, whatever it may be, that gives flavour to coffee, is what is most valuable in it, and should be preserved with the greatest care, and that in estimating the strength or richness of that beverage, its fragrance should be much more attended to than either its bitterness or its astringency.

One pound avoirdupois, of good Mocha coffee, which, when properly roasted and ground, weighs only thirteen ounces, serves for making fifty-six full cups of very excellent coffee.

The quantity of ground coffee for one full cup, should not be less than 108 grains troy, which is rather less than a quarter of an ounce. This coffee, when made, fills a coffee-cup of the common size quite full.

In making coffee, several circumstances must be carefully attended to: in the first place, the coffee must be ground fine, otherwise the hot water will not have time to penetrate to the centres of the particles; it will merely soften them at their surfaces, and passing rapidly between them, will carry away but a small part of those aromatic and astringent substances on which the goodness of the liquor entirely depends. In this case the grounds of the coffee are more valuable than the insipid wash which has been hurried through them, and afterwards served up under the name of coffee.

Formerly, the ground coffee being put into a coffee-pot, with a sufficient quantity of water, the coffee-pot was put over the fire, and after the water had been made to boil a certain time, the pot was removed from the fire, and the grounds having had time to settle, or having been fined down with isinglass, the clear liquor was poured off, and immediately served up in cups. This was a bad practice of making coffee.

From the results of several experiments made by Count Rumford, to ascertain what proportion of the aromatic and volatile particles in the coffee escape, and are left in this process, he found that it amounted to considerably more than half.

When coffee is made in the most advantageous manner, the ground coffee is pressed down in a cylindrical vessel a, (fig. 4, plate facing the title page), which has its bottom pierced with many small holes, so as to form a metal strainer; a proper quantity of boiling hot water being poured cautiously on this layer of coffee in powder, the water penetrates it by degrees, and after a certain time begins to filter through it. This gradual percolation brings continually a succession of fresh particles of hot water into contact with the ground coffee; and when the last portion of the water has passed through it, every thing capable of being dissolved by the water will be found to be so completely washed out of it, that what remains will be of no kind of value.

It is, however, necessary to the complete success of this operation, that the coffee should be ground to a powder sufficiently fine. In order that the coffee may be perfectly good, the stratum of ground coffee, on which the boiling water is poured, must be of a certain thickness, and it must be pressed together with a certain degree of force, by means of the presses b, (fig. 4.) If it be too thin, or not sufficiently pressed together, the water will pass through it too rapidly; and if the layer of ground coffee be too thick, or if it be too much pressed together, the water will be too long in passing through it, and the taste of the coffee will be injured.

Count Rumford recommends, as of importance, that the surface of the coffee be rendered quite level after it is put into the strainer before any attempt is made to press it together, that the water, in percolating, may act equally on every part.

When the coffee is made, the strainer, or cylindrical vessel a is removed, and the lid of it is made to serve as the lid for the coffee pot.

The following table shews the diameters and heights of the cylindrical vessels, or strainers, to be used in making the following quantities of coffee:—

Metal coffee pots should be kept as bright as possible; for, when the external surface is kept clean and bright, the pot will be less cooled by the surrounding cold bodies than when its metallic splendour is impaired by neglecting to clean it; pots for making coffee in the manner stated in the preceding pages, may now be had in most of the tinmen’s shops of this metropolis.