Coffee question

Something I wrote recently got to me to thinking about coffee and old country practices. So I'll ask about it here.

In the South, also in the Army life, I was quite used to really bad coffee---that's because of severl things: the coffee was generally dry and old, manufactured in large quantities, and I suspect was significantly more robusto than arabica, so quality sucked. Also the coffee was almost always cooked in percolators (sometimes huge urns) and quite often sat all day until the urn was empty, so was cooked hot and stayed hot for sometimes an entire day or night. So it was reductio ad awfulum. Lots of scuzzy oils and bitter elements

Add to that the southern penchant (part cultural but largely based on poverty, if not war rationing) of adding chicory to coffee---roasted chicory, an extremely bitter component now found mostly in Louisiana coffee (Luzianne).

So here's the question: back in those days it was commonplace to toss in some dried eggshells---white eggshells almost every time--to the grounds before turning the percolator on. And in addition, it was common to throw in a hefty pinch of salt.

Now the salt I can kinda understand, assuming it was there to cut down/counter the extreme bitterness of burned chicory. The eggshells---I'm not so sure why they were used.

Anybody still do either of these things---use a percolator, use eggshells, or use salt when making coffee.

And if not any of those, have you ever had southern-style chicory coffee? And what did you think of it?

[Jenise]

Wow, eggshells and salt? I've not heard of either. Can't even guess why on the egg shells.

Re chicory, I've had it and didn't like it at all. In Louisiana, I drank tea. In fact, it was so hot when I was there that iced tea--straight out of bed--was preferable to anything hot.

...In the South, also in the Army life, I was quite used to really bad coffee---that's because of several things: the coffee was generally dry and old, manufactured in large quantities, and I suspect was significantly more robusto than arabica, so quality sucked. Also the coffee was almost always cooked in percolators (sometimes huge urns) and quite often sat all day until the urn was empty, so was cooked hot and stayed hot for sometimes an entire day or night. So it was reductio ad awfulum. Lots of scuzzy oils and bitter elements...

Actually, the coffee in the Marines was pretty good. No percolator. As I recall from mess duty, a large pot of water was brought to a boil. The heat was turned off and a 1 pound can of ground coffee was stirred in. After about 4-5 minutes, a cup of cold water was added and all the grounds would sink. Then the coffee was ladled off the top into large thermoses. Not unlike French press.

[Jenise]

I found this on the internet: "In the days of old (Olden Days) coffee was made in a pot of hot water with grounds on the bottom. As you are never suppose to boil coffee it was almost impossible not to not boil it by this method and if boiled it was bitter and muddy. Adding egg shells kept the gounds on the bottom, took the bitterness out of the taste and above all kept it CLEAR."

The clarity issue I didn't expect. But it stands to reason, as all of us can identify with re wine. Cloudy wine tastes different than clear wine, and apparently it's true in coffee, too. That eggshells alone would do that, though, is a surprise.

If the good Doctor Lipton were hanging around, he could tell us if there was some chemical reason for the egg shells. I vaguely remember someone once supposing that it was the calcium in the egg shells, but that may well have been WAG or male supposing.

And now that you mention it, Jenise, I do vaguely remember something in the recesses of what's left of my mind about the eggshells being there to help coffee clarity.

The salt seemed a gimme, with salt often being used to counter bitterness.

And Howie, la di da, I didn't know you jarheads were such sensitive and sophisticated coffee connoisseurs. Did you also hold your little pinkies out in the bar brawls?

And Howie, la di da, I didn't know you jarheads were such sensitive and sophisticated coffee connoisseurs. Did you also hold your little pinkies out in the bar brawls?

hehehe Actually we needed the coffee to try to remember the bar brawls the morning after.

In Ethiopia, the birthplace of Arabica coffee, one is offered a choice of sugar, salt or butter as additives to coffee.

Not sure what they would think about egg shells, but since the traditional coffee ceremony is an elaborate aspect of Ethiopian culture, perhaps best not to ask...

Particulate matter that otherwise would cause the coffee to be cloudy will instead stick to the eggshells. I'm not sure of the exact nature of the process, but I suspect it's similar to the way some of the fining agents used in winemaking work.

-Paul W.

I, too, remember the bad old days of percolated coffee at home. My maternal grandmother used to tell me about her Swedish mother-in-law's coffee making technique, which was to boil the coffee grounds in water rather than use a percolator. The Swedes drink this coffee with tons of sugar and milk.

Then along came Mr. Coffee, the first drip coffee maker marketed to the masses in the US. And the coffee world changed.

-Paul W.

[Jenise]

I, too, remember the bad old days of percolated coffee at home. My maternal grandmother used to tell me about her Swedish mother-in-law's coffee making technique, which was to boil the coffee grounds in water rather than use a percolator. The Swedes drink this coffee with tons of sugar and milk.

In Africa they make coffee this way using VERY finely ground coffee beans and they, too, drink it with a lot of sugar. With this method some silty sludge results, but I actually find that an interesting textural aspect. I guess Turkish coffee is about the same.

[Robin Garr]

I guess Turkish coffee is about the same.

That's the way they did it in all the Greek coffee shops in Astoria, NYC, which was about as Greek as Greece is. Similar in all the Palestinian, Egyptian, Lebanese, etc., eateries I've ever had coffee. I think it's probably an ancient technique that's still traditional all around the Eastern Mediterranean. Was your experience in North Africa or farther south, Jenise?

I, too, remember the bad old days of percolated coffee at home. My maternal grandmother used to tell me about her Swedish mother-in-law's coffee making technique, which was to boil the coffee grounds in water rather than use a percolator. The Swedes drink this coffee with tons of sugar and milk.

Then along came Mr. Coffee, the first drip coffee maker marketed to the masses in the US. And the coffee world changed.

-Paul W.

Of course you are correct, Paul. But there was a period---pre-Mr. Coffee---when coffee began to go through its revolution. I recall vividly in college I found a funky little place that was the first of the coffee-geek establishments---combination fresh-roasted beans roasted to order, unbleached coffee filters, and these things I recalled from Europe, the Melitta jugs.

It was then a revelation, because only geeks would do it, as it was mechanical hand-processing the coffee and you had to wait for it. Only people who REALLY enjoyed good coffee, and could afford it, would go through the procedure.

Then, of course, Mr. Coffee came along and the revelation became a revolution...and the coffee world changed.

In college I used that Melitta almost religiously. Now I don't recall what happened to it, and I use a basic Mr. Coffee in the morning and a Nespresso machine for maintaining balance during the day.

Now I don't recall what happened to it...

I know where mine are: one at the office and two in my kitchen cupboard. They were my twice-daily-use items for many years.

When I go to a coffee den for a cup of pour-over, it is still basically a Melitta cone they are using. They just get all fancy about weighing the coffee, the size of the grind, the temperature of the water, etc.

Spent some time in New Orleans last year and was concerned that I would only find crappy coffee mixed with chicory, but the food and drink scene is just too good to just be satisfied with that. A couple third wave/hipster coffee places that knew what they were doing are http://www.spitfirecoffee.com and http://www.soloespressobar.com .

[Robin Garr]

Spent some time in New Orleans last year and was concerned that I would only find crappy coffee mixed with chicory

Maybe it's just me and the ineffable romance of the City That Care Forgot, but I like me some chicory coffed from Cafe du Monde.

Spent some time in New Orleans last year and was concerned that I would only find crappy coffee mixed with chicory

Maybe it's just me and the ineffable romance of the City That Care Forgot, but I like me some chicory coffed from Cafe du Monde.

Next time I will try to get to Cafe du Monde and have a cuppa. I was having too good a time staying not far from Solo Expresso in the Bywater and walking/biking around everywhere at all hours. If I paid attention to the standard tourist advice I should be dead. One side effect of this was that I spent very little time in the French Quarter, which smelt like stale beer and puke when I rode the bike through on Sunday AM....

I even scored one of those great wine bargains in N.O.: $28 for a 2008 bottle of Niepoort Charme from a wine shop in the Garden District. It must have been marked incorrectly, but I tried to give the person working the till a chance to say so, but they seemed to think that it was marked correctly (check wine-searcher.com!).

One side effect of this was that I spent very little time in the French Quarter, which smelt like stale beer and puke when I rode the bike through on Sunday AM....

Sunday AM is a bad time to bike through any party site.

However, I do agree with you that the French Quarter is over-hyped. The only thing I found there that truly transported me was Preservation Hall -- no alcohol, no light show, no stage, no chairs (...benches) -- and the bands just stand in front of you and play Dixieland. Nothing to distract you or them. It's sweet or it ain't but what a place.

Spent some time in New Orleans last year and was concerned that I would only find crappy coffee mixed with chicory

Maybe it's just me and the ineffable romance of the City That Care Forgot, but I like me some chicory coffee from Cafe du Monde.

Robin, that's the only time I drink chicory coffee now, at Cafe du Monde. It's just traditional! Black, bitter coffee (I don't care for the NO version of cafe au lait) while sitting in a powdery blizzard of sugar. It's like heaven.

My alt place now is Cafe Beignet (a block and half down from the Monteleone on Royal). A small storefront that does some pretty tasty beignets (with good espresso coffee), and you can step out to the side and sit under the shade of the trees in the corner of the forecourt of the Quarter Police Station HQ, and watch and listen to the old guy singing hymns and gospel songs on the sidewalk. I love that.

And Joe's right; it's possible to get very good coffee (non-chicory) in the Big Easy.

[Jenise]

Speaking of Melitta coffee, in Costa Rica a "traditional Costa Rican" coffee is more or less the same principal but poured through a reusable thing that looks like, and is probably not coincidentally about the same flesh-toned color as, a compression sock suspended by an arc of wood over a platform for the cup.

Speaking of Melitta coffee, in Costa Rica a "traditional Costa Rican" coffee is more or less the same principal but poured through a reusable thing that looks like, and is probably not coincidentally about the same flesh-toned color as, a compression sock suspended by an arc of wood over a platform for the cup.

The parents of a friend of mine were from Cuba. They moved to NYC in the 1930s and they always made their coffee using a tan cloth bag. My friend's uncle, also from Cuba, was a coffee importer in NYC. According to him (1960s) Maxwell House paid the most for their coffee beans, but Chock ful o Nuts paid the most for their roasting process.

I found this on the internet: "In the days of old (Olden Days) coffee was made in a pot of hot water with grounds on the bottom. As you are never suppose to boil coffee it was almost impossible not to not boil it by this method and if boiled it was bitter and muddy. Adding egg shells kept the gounds on the bottom, took the bitterness out of the taste and above all kept it CLEAR."

The clarity issue I didn't expect. But it stands to reason, as all of us can identify with re wine. Cloudy wine tastes different than clear wine, and apparently it's true in coffee, too. That eggshells alone would do that, though, is a surprise.

My wife remembers camping when in the Girl Scouts, eggs for breakfast, shells used when making coffee. Probably used by the elders in the troop.