Coffee Alternatives
There are many recipes for making coffee substitutes. Here are some popular commercial ones and their ingredients. Some are simply roasted roots grains or blends of them. In a long term SHTF event, when the real coffee runs (dread!), a homemade brew might be a very welcome addition to your meals (and maybe a trade item). As you will see, there many ingredients, and all manner of blends, that can be used to make rich, good-tasting coffee substitutes or extenders (many of these are healthy too!): roasted barley, wheat, oats, fax, rye, chickpeas, parsnips root, chicory root, burdock root and dandelion root.
Commercial Coffee Alternatives
• Postum- ingredients: roasted wheat bran, wheat and molasses (a personal favorite).
• Pero- ingredients: malted barley, roasted barley, chicory and rye
• Cafix- ingredients: roasted barley, chicory, malted barley, figs, and extract of red beet.
• Kaffree Roma- ingredients: roasted barley, roasted malt barley, roasted chicory, and roasted rye
• Beyond Coffee- ingredients: roast chicory, barley, and rye
• Oro Cevada- ingredients: 100% roasted barely
• Teeccino Herbal Coffee Alternative- ingredients: roast barley, chicory root, and dates or figs (for sweetness).
• Dandy Blend Coffee Alternative - ingredients: roasted barley, rye, chicory root, dandelion root and sugar beet.
Homemade Coffee Alternatives
• Sophie’s Coffee Substitute Recipe
o 1 Tablespoon- roasted chicory root, ground
o 1 Tablespoon- roasted dandelion root, ground
o 4 Cups- water
• Barley Coffee Substitute Recipe
o Spread a thin layer of barley onto a cookie sheet inside a 425o F oven and bake (stirring frequently) until it's uniformly dark brown.
o Grind the browned barley in an coffee or food mill.
o Perk one heaping teaspoon of barley per cup of water.
• Parsnip Postum Coffee Substitute Recipe
o Cut fresh parsnip roots into small pieces
o Dehydrate root bits and roast at 400o F until dark brown (about 20 minutes).
o Steep one rounded tablespoonful of roasted parsnips in one cup of boiling hot water.
• Wheat and Molasses Coffee Substitute
o Six cups of cracked wheat combine with a cup of milk, a half cup of molasses; and one-half teaspoon of salt
o Mix well then spread out thinly on cookie sheet and bake in a 300o F degree oven.
o When brown, turn the oven to low and allow the wheat molasses mixture to dry until crisp.
o Break into pieces and grind in a coffee grinder or food mill
• Garbanzo (Chickpea) Bean Coffee Substitute
o Roast chickpeas at 300o F until brown-black, then grind coffee grinder.
o Add the ground chickpeas the same as you would regular coffee, and perk until the liquid looks like coffee.
o Or boil the ground chickpea in water but let the boiled pot stand for a few minutes before pouring.
Preparing Burdock, Dandelion or Chicory Root for Making Alternatives
• Spring roots are less bitter and chewy if you dig them before the plants start to blossom. Freezing of winter converts the inulin to fructose, which makes spring roots more palatable.
• Slice thick roots lengthwise into strips of uniform thickness to decrease drying time and encourage uniform drying.
• Chop or break the dried roots into small 1/4″ pieces, spread on a roasting pan and toast at 350o F stirring occasionally.
• Or slowly roast in a 200°F oven for around 4 to 7 hours, stir occasionally (preserves more inulin).
• When browned and completely cool, grind with a coffee grinder.
• During roasting, inulin transforms into sugar, and the roasted dandelion and chicory loses some of its bitter taste and has a mellowing down the effect on coffee.
• Place 1 heaping teaspoon of ground root in a cup of water, steep or boil for 10 minutes and strain.
• There are two main ways of brewing chicory, burdock, and dandelion and each way has its advantages.
o Boil it on a low heat for 10 minutes, and then serve it. The advantage of boiling it for a long time is that more of the inulin transforms into sugar.
o Or just steep it, at lower temperatures, as you would with coffee.
o If you boil a mix of coffee and chicory, burdock or dandelion, all the delicate aroma of coffee will be burnt by the prolonged exposure to high temperature so you should brew your blend as you would regular coffee, steeping and dripping on a filter.
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