Civil War Sweet Potato Coffee

A Civil War coffee substitute made with sweet potatoes and rye

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City/Region: United States of America

Time Period: 1860s

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For Civil War soldiers, coffee was a necessity for both sides; the only problem was that, for the South, coffee was rarely available. Within months of the first shots fired at Fort Sumter, recipes for coffee alternatives were being printed in newspapers all over the South and with varying success at mimicking that Java flavor. These recipes were used at first to stretch coffee rations, then as a replacement when coffee couldn't be gotten at all. While it tastes and looks nothing like coffee, it’s actually quite a pleasant drink with flavor coming mostly from the sweet potato with a little nuttiness from the rye.

“Preparation - Peel your potatoes and slice them rather thin; dry them in the air or on the stove; then cut into pieces small enough to go into the coffee mill, then grind it. Two tablespoons full of ground coffee and three or four of ground potatoes will make eight or nine cups of coffee, clear, pure and well tasted.”

— The Albany Patriot, Albany, Baker County, Georgia. December 12, 1861

“Take rye, boil it, but not so much as to burst the grain; then dry it, either in the sun, on the stove, or in a kiln, after which it is ready for parching, to be used like the real Coffee Bean. Prepared in this manner, it can hardly be distinguished from the genuine Coffee.”

— From the Charleston Mercury. Febrary 8, 1862

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Ingredients:

• 4 to 5 sweet potatoes or yams
• 1 cup (120 g) rye
• 1 quart (scant 1 liter) water

Instructions:

1. For the sweet potato: Wash and peel the sweet potatoes, then slice them very thinly and lay them out on some trays that have been lined with aluminum foil.
2. To dry them in the oven, set it to the lowest temperature. Mine took about 3 hours to dry, this may vary depending on your oven and how thinly you slice the sweet potatoes. You want them to be completely dry. If you want to dry them in the sun, it could take all day. I’m not exactly sure because I tried to do this, but the squirrels kept stealing my potatoes.
3. Break the sweet potato slices into small pieces, then grind them in a coffee grinder.
4. For the rye: Add the rye to a pot of boiling water, then reduce it to a simmer and cook for 12 minutes. Strain the rye and spread it out in a thin layer to dry either on the stovetop or in a low oven like with the sweet potatoes. Roast in a dry pan until fragrant. then grind in a coffee grinder.
5. To make the coffee: Mix the ground sweet potato and rye together. I used half sweet potato, half rye, but if you’re recreating a cup of Civil War coffee from the earlier days of the war, you can add one part ground coffee to the mixture.
6. Bring a quart of water to a boil, take it off the heat, then add a heaping 1/4 cup of your mix. Stir and let it steep for 7 to 8 minutes, or until the grounds have fallen to the bottom.
7. For a full Civil War meal, pour the coffee into a tin cup, grab a piece of hardtack (clack clack) or a heaping helping of hellfire stew, and serve it forth.

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