Coffee Substitutes

Wartime blockades, taxes, temperance movements, religions, health-food Adventists, and the very great expanse and rough terrain of the country itself (leading to high transportation costs) have all challenged Americans’ access to coffee. Chicory (“coffeeweed”) roots, roasted and ground, had long been used to extend or adulterate coffee in Europe as well as in America. But ingenuity stepped up to adversity. Americans had found substitutes—some better than others—in barley, sweet potatoes, acorns, beets, grains (rye, barley, cornmeal, millet, and grain sorghum), figs, seeds (the Kentucky coffee tree, grape, locust, persimmon, okra, and cotton), parsnips, field peas, walnuts, crushed walnut shells, pumpkin shells, corn, corn cobs, and soybeans.