I found this very interesting link a while ago that has articles from the Civil War years. Evidently, coffee was so very expensive back then that people tried roasting other seeds and plants. They tried beets, acorns, corn, even asparagus and okra seeds. Since I roast my own coffee now and then and decided to try one of these substitutes myself. The results were fascinating.
I dried and roasted a sweet potato per the instructions at the above link. And, it wasn't bad! Some of those Civil War newspaper articles even recommended drinking this instead of coffee. Well - I don't know if that was for the taste, or if they were just playing sour grapes because real coffee cost so much back then.
Here's the process I followed: I skinned a single yam and cut it into small pieces as instructed. I then dried the pieces in my oven at about 175 degrees for almost 3 hours. The difference in size was dramatic. Going in, the pieces almost didn't fit in a single layer on my cookie sheet. But, coming out, they were shrunk to about 1/4 their original size and were almost hard. I think I'll dry them even more the next time. (And yes, there is going to be many next times.)
I then roasted them in a pan over a gas flame like I do with green coffee beans. I have a range hood vented to the outside to carry away any smoke. It took just under 10 minutes for the little dried cubes and sticks to turn dark brown. I had to remove some of the larger hunks that didn't brown as evenly.
The roasted cubes and sticks were larger than coffee beans and wouldn't grind in my coffee grinder, so I bashed them with a soup can while inside a plastic bag to make them fit. I poured the bashed roasted sweet potatoes back into the grinder and they came out just like ground coffee. I'll cut them smaller next time.
The roasted and ground sweet potatoes smelled similar to coffee, but I could tell it wasn't really coffee. I then made 4 cups in my coffee maker and here are the results.
Beautiful dark brown color, darker than regular coffee. Even the little bubbles were a dark brown. Full-bodied - not quite as aromatic as coffee, but it has a pleasant aroma. And the taste? Well, it's very coffee-like, but different. It's hard to describe, but it's definitely coffee. I do notice a caramel taste. I added some sugar and half-n-half as I do for regular coffee. I suspect that you could substitute real coffee with sweet potato coffee in some restaurants and nobody would notice.
I'll have to try some of the other recipes in that link.
I'm very interested in your antiquarian pursuits, though not yet feeling the urge, personally, to begin yam roasting (or sweet potato roasting, as the case may be). I hope you'll keep us up to date with your experiments.
Posted Sat Jul 4, 2009, 2:32am Subject: Re: CONFEDERATE COFFEE SUBSTITUTES - Something else to roast
I buy 10lbs at a time of raw almonds from a CA farmer on ebay.. Usually eat them raw for TV snacks instead of junk.. The last few times I did coffee I did up 8oz of these nuts....(P1 about 10min in the Behmor) to chop up on vegies and salad....Mmmmmmm...
Posted Sat Jul 4, 2009, 7:36am Subject: Re: CONFEDERATE COFFEE SUBSTITUTES - Something else to roast
I've roasted almonds (and other nuts) in the popcorn popper a few times. Their mass is such that they don't move around if I add too many. After 2 minutes they're about done, at least on the outside. There was a cracking sound as they heated.
But to try almonds in the Behmor, now THAT would work. Did you hear a cracking sound when they started to finish roasting? Maybe a gentle (P5) profile would allow for more control...
Posted Sat Jul 4, 2009, 11:37am Subject: Re: CONFEDERATE COFFEE SUBSTITUTES - Something else to roast
Just a word of caution about roasting nuts in general: Peanuts have a LOT of oil that quickly comes out in roasting at a high temperature. I wouldn't roast them in the Behmor.
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