Acorn Coffee

Peel the husks from sound ripe acorns, divide the kernels, dry them gradually, and roast them in a close vessel; while roasting they should be stirred continually, and small pieces of butter added from time to time. Care must be taken not to burn, or roast them too much. When roasted, they may be ground and used as ordinary coffee.

Coffee

Beat an egg, and to one teacupful of ground coffee, add one-third of the beaten egg, and as much cold water as will just moisten the coffee; do not put in much cold water, stir all well together, put the mixture in your coffee pot, and pour over it six tea-cupfuls of boiling water. Let it boil hard for ten or fifteen minutes. When it begins to boil, stir it frequently, and never leave it until the grounds sink, which they will do in a few minutes after it has been on the fire. Be careful and do not let your coffee boil over, as by that means you lose a great deal of the grounds, and consequently the coffee will be weakened. Rinse your pot, if it be silver or Britannia metal, with hoiking water, pour the coffee into it, and serve it hot. Coffee and tea lose much of their flavor if served cold.

How To Roast Coffee

Pick the black or imperfect grains from the coffee. Put it in a pan, and stir it all the time it is roasting; when done, it should be the color of the hull of a ripe chestnut. It should be brown all through, but not black. About ten minutes before it is done, add to two pounds of coffee, half an ounce of butter. Whilst hot, put it in a box, and cover it closely.

Notice of coffee, from Sir H. Blunt's travels in 1534. "They (the Turks) have another drink, called cauphe, made of a berry as big as a small bean, dried in a furnace and beat to a powder, of a sooty color, that they seethe and drink, in taste, a little bitterish, but as may be endured - it is thought to be the old black broth, used so much by the Lacedemonians; it drieth ill humors in the stomach, comforteth the brain, etc."