All About Coffee Part 136

The Napierian coffee machine has enjoyed great popularity in England.

The principle has in later years been incorporated in the Napier-List steam coffee machine for use in hotels, ships, restaurants, etc. Steam is used as a source of heat, but does not mix with the coffee. List's patent is for an improvement on the Napierian system and was granted in 1891.

It is related that shortly before he died, old Mr. Napier, at the termination of a dispute in Smith & Co.'s factory at Glasgow, where the device was being made under his instruction, said to old Mr. Smith:

"You may be a guid silversmith, but I am a better engineer."

[Ill.u.s.tration: FINLEY ACKER'S FILTER-PAPER COFFEE POT

SHOWING METHOD OF OPERATION]

In 1841, William Ward Andrews was granted an English patent on an improved pot employing a pump to force the boiling water through the ground coffee while contained in a perforated cylinder screwed to the bottom of the pot.

In 1842, the first French patent on a gla.s.s coffee-making device was granted to Madame Va.s.sieux of Lyons.

Following this, there were numerous patents issued in France and England on double gla.s.s-globe coffee-making devices. They were first known as double gla.s.s balloons, and most of them employed metal strainers.

After this, there were many "percolator" patents in France, England, and the United States, some of which were for improved forms of the original drip method of the De Belloy device. Others were for the type of machine which came to be known as "percolators" because they employed the principle of raising the heated water and spraying it over the ground coffee in continuous fashion. The story is told in chronological order in the chapter on the evolution of coffee apparatus; so it is not necessary to repeat it here. Numerous filtration devices also were produced abroad and in the United States.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE KIN-HEE POT IN OPERATION]

Among the percolators, those of Manning, Bowman & Co., and of Landers, Frary & Clark, became well known here. In the filtration field, the following attained considerable distinction: Harvey Ricker's Half-Minute pot, employing a cotton sack with re-inforced bottom, introduced about 1881; the Kin-Hee pot of 1900; Cauchois' Private Estate coffee maker, using j.a.panese filter paper, introduced in 1905; Finley Acker's percolator, introduced the same year, which also employed a filter paper between two cylinders having side perforations; the Tricolator, 1908; King's percolator, using filter paper, in 1912; and the "Make-Right", 1911, with its adaptation as presented in the Tru-Bru pot of 1920.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE TRICOLATOR IN OPERATION]

The Make-Right was the invention of Edward Aborn, New York, and comprised two telescoping open wire frames, or baskets, with a flat piece of muslin between them. In the Tru-Bru pot, the same idea was employed, except that the wire frames were so constructed as to furnish four drip points to afford better distribution on the ground coffee and to lessen the time of filtration. There was also a porcelain top, to house and to raise the filtration device, above the brew with an opening through which the boiling water could be poured without exposing the ground coffee.

[Ill.u.s.tration: KING PERCOLATOR, AS APPLIED TO A HOTEL OR RESTAURANT URN]

Among later developments of the genuine percolator principle that have attracted attention in this country, mention should be made of the Phylax coffee maker, and the Galt pot.

In 1914-16, there was a revival of interest in the United States in the double gla.s.s-globe method of making coffee, introduced into France as "double gla.s.s balloons" in the first half of the nineteenth century.

American ingenuity produced several clever adaptations, and several notable filter improvements. Advertising developed a great demand for gla.s.s percolators, as they were first called; but although five attained considerable prominence, only two survived and, at this writing, are still being manufactured. Both are double gla.s.s-globe filters employing a spirit lamp, gas, or electricity as heating agents.

[Ill.u.s.tration: THREE TYPES OF AMERICAN COFFEE MAKERS IN OPERATION

Left, Blanke's Cloth Filter--Center, Phylax--Right, Galt Vacuum device]

Within the last few years, it has become the fashion to obtain patents in the United States on "the art of brewing coffee", or the "art of making coffee". Instances are the patents issued to Messrs. Calkin and Muller. In the Calkin patent (the Phylax device ill.u.s.trated at the top of this page) the "art" consists in controlling the flow of the boiling water by means of the number and s.p.a.cing of the holes in the water-spreader, so as to restrict the volume and the speed, to effect a quick initial extraction; and then, by means of a new s.p.a.cing of holes in the infuser, r.e.t.a.r.ding the drip "to attain a prolonged extraction of the tannin and other elements of slow extraction and combining the liquids obtained during the initial and subsequent stages of the brew for attaining a balanced liquid extract."

[Ill.u.s.tration: HOW THE TRU-BRU POT OPERATES]

Muller's "art" (the apparatus is described in chapter x.x.xIV) consisted in so supplying and supporting the ground coffee in an urn that it is never again subjected to the "decoction" after having been exposed to the air and steam following the first application of the water.

In 1920, William G. Goldsworthy, San Francisco, was granted a United States patent on a process for preparing the beans for making the beverage. The process consisted of grinding the raw dried beans; then packing the ground product in non-combustible and non-soluble porous containers, which are securely closed to keep them unimpaired while the contained coffee is being roasted; and, after cooling, sealing them with gelatine. To brew, container and contents are dropped into a cup of hot water.

[Ill.u.s.tration: COFFEE-MAKING DEVICES USED IN THE UNITED STATES

1--Marlon Harland Pot; 2--Universal Percolator; 3--Galt Vacuum Process Coffee Maker; 4--Universal Electric Urn; 5--English Coffee Biggin (Langley Ware); 6--Universal Cafenoira (Gla.s.s Filter); 7--Vienna (Bohemian or Carlsbad) Coffee Machine; 8--Tru-Bru Pot; 9--Tricolator; 10--Manning-Bowman Percolator; 11--Blanke's Sanitary Coffee Pot; 12--Phylax Coffee Maker; 13--Private-Estate Coffee Maker; 14--American French Drip Pot; 15--Kin-Hee Pot; 16--Silex Opalescent Gla.s.s Filter; 17--French Drip Pot (Langley Ware).]

This brief review of the evolution of coffee brews shows that coffee making started with boiling, and next became an infusion. After that, the best practise became divided between simple percolation and filtration, which have continued to the present time. Boiling has also continued to find advocates in every country, even in the United States, where it seems to die hard, no matter how much is done to discredit it.

Percolation devices are subdivided into the simple drip pots and the continuous percolation machines, as represented by numerous complicated and high-priced contrivances on the market. Gradually, however, true coffee lovers are realizing that the best results are to be obtained through simple percolation or simple filtration. There are good arguments for both methods.

_Coffee Making in Europe in the Nineteenth Century_

ENGLAND. We have noted Count Rumford's efforts to reform coffee making in England in the early part of the nineteenth century. Many other scientific men joined the movement. Among them was Professor Donovan, who in the _Dublin Philosophical Journal_ for May, 1826, told of his experiments "to ascertain the best methods for extracting all the virtues inherent in the berry." The _Penny Magazine_ for June 14, 1834, after deploring "the straw-colored fluid commonly introduced under the misnomer of coffee in England", thus digests Professor Donovan's findings:

Mr. Donovan found, that what we shall call the medicinal quality of coffee resides in it independent of its aromatic flavor,--that it is possible to obtain the exhilarating effect of the beverage without gratifying the palate,--and, on the other hand, that all the aromatic quality may be enjoyed without its producing any effect upon the animal economy. His object was to combine the two.

The roasting of coffee is requisite for the production of both these qualities; but, to secure them in their full degree, it is necessary to conduct the process with some skill. The first thing to be done is to expose the raw coffee to the heat of a gentle fire, in an open vessel, stirring it continually until it a.s.sumes a yellowish colour. It should then be roughly broken,--a thing very easily done,--so that each berry is divided into about four or five pieces, when it must be put into the roasting apparatus. This, as most commonly used, is made of sheet-iron, and is of a cylindrical shape: it no doubt answers the purpose well, and is by no means a costly machine, but coffee may be very well roasted in a common iron or earthenware pot, the main circ.u.mstances to be observed being the degree to which the process is carried, and the prevention of partial burning, by constant stirring. One of the requisites for having good coffee is that it shall have been recently roasted.

Coffee should be ground very fine for use, and only at the moment when it is wanted, or the aromatic flavour will in some measure be lost. To extract all its good qualities, the powder requires two separate and somewhat opposite modes of treatment, but which do not offer any difficulty when explained. On the one hand, the fine flavour would be lost by boiling, while, on the other, it is necessary to subject the coffee to that degree of heat in order to extract its medicinal quality. The mode of proceeding, which, after many experiments, Mr. Donovan found to be the most simple and efficacious for attaining both these ends, was the following:--

The whole water to be used must be divided into two equal parts.

One half must be put first to the coffee "cold", and this must be placed over the fire until it "just comes to a boil", when it must be immediately removed. Allowing it then to subside for a few moments the liquid must be poured off as clear as it will run. The remaining half of the water, which during this time should have been on the fire, must then be added "at a boiling heat" to the grounds, and placed on the fire, where it must be kept "boiling"

for about three minutes. This will extract the medicinal virtue, and if then the liquid be allowed again to subside, and the clear fluid be added to the first portion, the preparation will be found to combine all the good properties of the berry in as great perfection as they can be obtained. If any fining ingredient is used it should be mixed with the powder at the beginning of the process.

Several kinds of apparatus, some of them very ingenious in their construction, have been proposed for preparing coffee, but they are all made upon the principle of extracting only the aromatic flavour, while Professor Donovan's suggestions not only enable us to accomplish that desirable object, but superadd the less obvious but equally essential matter of extracting and making our own all the medicinal virtues.

When Webster and Parkes published their _Encyclopedia of Domestic Economy_, London, 1844, they gave the following as "the most usual method of making coffee in England":

Put fresh ground coffee into a coffee-pot, with a sufficient quant.i.ty of water, and set this on the fire till it boils for a minute or two; then remove it from the fire, pour out a cupful, which is to be returned into the coffee-pot to throw down the grounds that may be floating; repeat this, and let the coffee-pot stand near the fire, but not on too hot a place, until the grounds have subsided to the bottom; in a few minutes the coffee will be clear without any other preparation, and may be poured into cups; in this manner, with good materials in sufficient quant.i.ty, and proper care, excellent coffee may be made. The most valuable part of the coffee is soon extracted, and it is certain that long boiling dissipates the fine aroma and flavour. Some make it a rule not to suffer the coffee to boil, but only to bring it just to the boiling point; but it is said by Mr. Donovan that it requires boiling for a little time to extract the whole of the bitter, in which he conceives much of the exhilarating qualities of the coffee reside.

This work had also the following to say on the clearing of coffee, which was then a much-mooted question:

The clearing of coffee is a circ.u.mstance demanding particular attention. After the heaviest parts of the grounds have settled, there are still fine particles suspended for some time, and if the coffee be poured off before these have subsided, the liquor is deficient in that transparency which is one test of its perfection; for coffee not well cleared has always an unpleasant bitter taste.

In general, the coffee becomes clear by simply remaining quiet for a few minutes, as we have stated; but those who are anxious to have it as clear as possible employ some artificial means of a.s.sisting the clearing. The addition of a little isingla.s.s, hartshorn shavings, skins of eels or soles, white of eggs, egg sh.e.l.ls, etc., has been recommended for clearing; but it is evident that these substances, to produce their effect, which is upon the same principle as the fining of beer or wine, should be dissolved previously, for if put in without, it would require so much time to dissolve, that the flavour of the coffee would vanish.

Coffee-making devices of this period in England, in addition to the Rumford type of percolator and the popular coffee biggin, included Evans' machine provided with a tin air-float to which was attached a filter bag containing the coffee; Jones' apparatus, a pumping percolator; Parker's steam-fountain coffee maker, which forced the hot water upward through the ground coffee; Platow's patent filter, previously mentioned, a single vacuum gla.s.s percolator in combination with an urn; Brain's vacuum or pneumatic filter employing a "muslin, linen or shamoy leather filter" and an exhausting pump, designed for kitchen use; and Palmer's and Beart's pneumatic filtering machines of similar construction.

Cold infusions were common, the practise being to let them stand overnight, to be filtered in the morning, and only heated, not boiled.

Coffee grinding for these various types of coffee makers was performed by iron mills; the portable box mill being most favored for family use.

"It consisted of a square box either of mahogany or iron j.a.panned, containing in the interior a hollow cone of steel with sharp grooves on the inside; into this fits a conical piece of hardened iron or steel having spiral grooves cut upon its surface and capable of being turned round by a handle." There was a drawer to receive the finely ground coffee. Larger wall-mills employed the same grinding mechanism.

In 1855, Dr. John Doran wrote in his "Table Traits":

With regard to the making of coffee, there is no doubt that the Turkish method of pounding the coffee in a mortar is infinitely superior to grinding it in a mill, as with us. But after either method the process recommended by M. Soyer may be advantageously adopted; namely, "Put two ounces of ground coffee into a stew-pan, which set upon the fire, stirring the coffee round with a spoon until quite hot, then pour over a pint of boiling water; cover over closely for five minutes, pa.s.s it through a cloth, warm again, and serve."

From observations by G.W. Poore, M.D., London, 1883, we are given a glimpse of coffee making in England in the latter part of the nineteenth century. He said:

Those who wish to enjoy really good coffee must have it fresh roasted. On the Continent, in every well-regulated household, the daily supply of coffee is roasted every morning. In England this is rarely done.

If roasted coffee has to be kept, it must be kept in an air-tight vessel. In France, coffee used to be kept in a wrapper of waxed leather, which was always closely tied over the contained coffee.

In this way the coffee was kept from contact with any air.

The Viennese say that coffee should be kept in a gla.s.s bottle closed with a bung, and that coffee should on no account be kept in a tin canister.

The coffee having been roasted, it has to be reduced to a coa.r.s.e powder before the infusion is made. The grinding and powdering of coffee should be done just before it is wanted, for if the whole coffee seeds quickly lose their aroma, how much more quickly will the aroma be dissipated from coffee which has been reduced to a fine powder? Nothing need be said in the matter of coffee mills.