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Hot Coffee in Eight Ways
Hot coffee is almost as popular on the New York soda counters as chocolate; indeed, in some of the stores it goes better than chocolate. Of the many different formulas of its manufacture the following five seem to have a general call over all others: Formula I.-Take 5 ounces of the best Java and Mocha coffees mixed and powdered moderately fine, 4 ounces of glycerin, 2½ pounds of sugar, and sufficient water. Mix the glycerin with 28 ounces of water, moisten the coffee with this mixture, let stand ½ hour, pack firmly in a percolator, not tin; pour on the remainder of the liquid, previously heated to boiling, and, when this liquid has disappeared from the surface of the coffee, add boiling hot water until 40 ounces of percolate are obtained; to the latter add the sugar and dissolve by agitation. Serve by drawing 2 ounces to an 8-ounce mug, add 1 ounce of cream, fill with hot water, top with whipped cream, and serve with a spoon and sweet crackers. Formula II.-Another way is to take coffee of any good kind in any desired mixture-always, no matter what formula you use, get good coffee, for economy in that direction is not economy at all. About 32 ounces is the usual amount. Take 4 4 ounces of sugar and enough water to make 64 ounces. Moisten the coffee thoroughly, let stand in a covered vessel until softened, pack in percolator, cover the coffee with a heavy filter turned up at the edge, and upon the whole pour boiling hot water. Allow the percolate to flow into a funnel or percolator containing the sugar, and continue adding the boiling water until 4 pints of syrup are obtained, taking care that all the sugar is dissolved. If the process is conducted in the manner described, the odor of coffee will scarcely be observed in the room, a desideratum upon which the New York dispensers are a long way from agreeing upon. Serve like the preceding. Formula III. Sixteen ounces of coffee, freshly roasted and ground, may be mixed with 48 ounces of sugar, 2 ounces of the best French brandy, and sufficient boiling water, and will make a drink that will win popularity. Moisten the coffee with some hot water mixed with the brandy, pack in a percolator, pour on boiling water until 32 ounces of percolate are obtained, and in this dissolve the sugar by agitation. About the best mixture of coffee to be used is one part of Java with 2 of Mocha. Serve like the preceding. Formula IV. Hot coffee may also be served by using extract and sugar mixing them as required. For extract of coffee use either of these two formulas: Ten ounces Mocha coffee, 10 ounces Java coffee, sufficient glycerin and water. Mix the two coffees and grind to fine powder. Then moisten with a mixture of I volume of glycerin and 3 of water, pack in a percolator and percolate slowly until 16 ounces of percolate are obtained. More complete extraction will be obtained by pouring the menstruum in a hot condition on the drug. If on the residue of the drug be poured the same menstruum, until about 20 ounces of percolate are obtained, the latter may be used to make a subsequent preparation of the same kind, thus insuring a stronger extract. Only a glass percolator should be used for this extraction, and only the very best coffee should be used. Some coffee extracts are made of only one-half the strength of this. Some are made with diluted alcohol as a menstruum, but this way is to be preferred: or: Five ounces moderately fine Java coffee, 5 ounces moderately fine Mocha coffee, enough hot water to make 30 ounces, 1 ounce of the best French brandy. Moisten the coffee with the water, pack into a percolator, pour on the remainder of the coffee and add the brandy. In serving, add about 1 ounce of either of the extracts you use for an 8-ounce mug, add sufficient sugar and about 1 ounce of cream, fill with hot water, top with whipped cream, and serve with spoon and sweet crackers. Hot coffee served by using the extract may be called "hot coffee boshea." Formula V.-This is another formula: One pound of finely ground Mocha and Java coffee, 44 ounces of sugar, 2 drams of vanilla extract, and sufficient boiling water. Pack the coffee in a percolator and pour boiling water upon it until 2 pints of liquid are obtained. In the latter dissolve the sugar and add the extract. This makes, when served with cream, a most pleasant cup of coffee. Formula VI.-If you wish to make a hot "French" coffee, make it like the fourth formula, only omit the cream. Formula VII.-Another good coffee is made of 4 cubes of loaf sugar, 1 dessertspoonful of extract Mocha coffee, 1 dessertspoonful prepared milk, a cupful hot water, 1 tablespoonful whipped cream. Formula VIII. - This coffee must be made daily, or as much oftener as required: Use a separate urn and a fine quality of ground coffee. The infusion of some kinds becomes bitter after standing for an hour or two. Put ½ pound of the ground coffee in a bolting cloth bag, place the bag on the diaphragm of the urn and pour over it 1 gallon of boiling water. In five minutes draw off ½ gallon of the liquor and pour it back over the coffee; repeat this once or twice. After fifteen minutes remove the bag containing the coffee grounds and keep the infusion hot. In serving, use ½ ounce of cream and fill up the cup with the hot coffee. Serve loaf cut sugar. Extracts cannot be used for this coffee.
These are soda-fountain formulas written for a druggist, not a home cook: the aim is a concentrated coffee syrup or extract that keeps behind the counter and is diluted to order. A few of the terms belong to the pharmacy rather than the kitchen.
- Percolation means the pharmacist's methodThe "percolator" here is a tapered glass or porcelain cylinder packed with damp grounds, through which liquid drains slowly by gravity — closer to a pour-over than to a stovetop percolator. The instruction "not tin" matters: coffee acids attack tinned metal and give a metallic taint. Glass, enamel or a plastic cone works.
- Ounces, weight and fluidSolids (coffee, sugar) are avoirdupois ounces by weight; percolate, water and cream are fluid ounces. 40 ounces of percolate is 5 cups, 4 pints of syrup is 8 cups. A dram is an eighth of a fluid ounce, so 2 drams of vanilla is about a teaspoon and a half.
- Formula II has a typo"4 4 ounces of sugar" is garbled in the original printing; against 32 ounces of coffee and a 64-ounce yield it is almost certainly 44 ounces, matching Formula V. Do not guess at 4.
- GlycerinFood-grade glycerin was used as a wetting agent and mild preservative: it helps the grounds swell evenly and keeps the finished extract from going flat over days on a shelf. It also adds sweetness and body. Leave it out and the extract is still good, but it will not hold as long.
- "Menstruum" and "drug"Pharmacy vocabulary. The menstruum is the extracting liquid — here water, water-and-glycerin, or dilute alcohol — and "the drug" simply means the coffee being extracted.
- Mocha and JavaOrigin names, not roast styles: Mocha for the Yemeni port, Java for the Indonesian island. Mocha-Java is often described as the oldest named blend in the trade. Any good medium-roast blend of a bright, fruity bean with a heavier-bodied one gives the same intent.
- SweetnessThese syrups are severely sweet by modern taste — Formula V dissolves 44 ounces of sugar in 2 pints of coffee, roughly a 1.4:1 sugar-to-liquid syrup. Formula I's serving of 2 ounces to an 8-ounce mug is more sugar than most drinkers now want; halve it and taste.
- Odds and ends of measureA dessertspoonful is two teaspoons. "Prepared milk" is probably evaporated or condensed milk, both common fountain stock. "Loaf sugar" in cubes is ordinary sugar cubes.
- Formula VIII and holding timeBolting cloth is the fine woven cloth used for sifting flour; a large muslin or a paper filter substitutes. The warning is sound — the recipe itself notes that some infusions turn bitter after standing an hour or two, so brew what will be drunk.
- Yield at the mugFormula I gives 40 ounces of syrup, about twenty 8-ounce servings at 2 ounces each. Formula IV's extract is stronger: 1 ounce per mug, so 16 ounces makes sixteen cups.
By the turn of the twentieth century the American soda fountain was a year-round business, and hot drinks were how a druggist kept the marble counter earning through the winter. Hot chocolate led, and hot coffee — dispensed exactly like a soda, as a concentrated syrup or extract cut with hot water at the moment of service — ran close behind it in New York. The technique is straight out of the dispensary: percolation with a stated menstruum, glycerin as a solvent and preservative, a glass column because metal spoils the product, all of it language a pharmacist read every day in the Pharmacopoeia. The debate the author notes, over whether the smell of brewing coffee should be allowed to fill the store, is a nice period detail; he records only that the New York dispensers were a long way from agreeing about it. "Boshea" for the extract-made version is unexplained here and looks like a borrowing of bohea, the old English name for a black tea, applied loosely; that reading is a guess rather than a documented one.