ADULTERANTS.
Great as the consumption of coffee is in Europe and the Americas, it has
become so necessary in every household, that the demand continues to
increase, and very full prices are maintained. The largely extended
plantations in Brazil, in Ceylon, in India, in Java, and in other
suitable localities, profitably opened up every day, altogether fail to
keep down prices, and will long continue to offer the strong inducement
of large profits!
Taking advantage of this great public want, the unscrupulous and
fraudulent trader foists upon the easily-duped masses of consumers vast
quantities of unwholesome and pernicious stuff, mixed in certain
proportions with coffee; and, although the law has interposed in the
case of chicory, forbidding, under penalties, its being sold mixed with
coffee, unless especially so labelled and declared, yet who can tell the
thousand and one mixtures that are still made and sold with it?
It may be said that all this can be prevented by purchasing only
unground coffee, in a roasted state, ready for grinding; but there are
those (to be reckoned by hundreds of thousands of families) who, having
no means of grinding this roasted coffee, are compelled to buy that
which is already ground, or go without altogether.
What abominations do these (in too many cases) not drink, then, under
the much abused name of _coffee_?
These reflections are forced upon my mind every time I enter a
coffee-house, and am called to put faith in the purity of the cup of
coffee set before me.
Visitors to the establishments of coffee-grinders speak of bags of the
husks of peas, and cobs of Indian corn, wheat, sea-biscuits, and other
articles, harmless enough in themselves, and in their right places,
where, indeed, they may be useful; but a coffee-mill is the wrong place
for these otherwise objectionable articles of consumption. It will not
be denied that the husks of peas or the cobs of maize are appropriately
placed in the trough from which our pigs feed; they will even add to the
delicacy and whiteness of the pork those very useful animals are
intended to yield us, but they are essentially out of place in our
coffee-cup. These, and various other articles, go to make what in the
trade is termed “Boston,” and this preparation the visitor, who has been
admitted to the arcana of the grinder, will find mixed in a large bin
ready for use. One who has been thus favoured, after describing the mill
used for grinding the coffee, speaks of another machine, called the
“mixer.” The “mixer” is a wooden cylinder revolving on a spindle at an
angle of 45°, and having internal arrangements to mix the coffee with
such proportion of adulterating material as the ingenuity or impudence
of the grinder may suggest. Here, like Macbeth’s witches over their
cauldron, presides the genius of the place, who casts in the ingredients
which constitute the villanous compound, which, done up in tins, is
finally ornamented with labels such as this:
FINEST PLANTATION COFFEE,
Roasted and ground on the most approved principle by
STEAM MACHINERY.
This coffee is with confidence highly recommended to the public, as the
fine aroma, so much appreciated, is entirely preserved by its being
PACKED FRESH FROM THE MILL.
We need scarcely say that the amount of nourishment contained in this
abominable _olio_ is infinitesimally small.
The _Scientific American_ of New York, of a recent date, records the
following fact: “The editor of the _Baltimore American_ lately visited
the commissary department of one of the large military hospitals, and
noticed several barrels of dried coffee grounds, the purpose whereof
excited his curiosity. The polite commissary informed him that they
received twelve dollars a barrel for the grounds. ‘But what is it
purchased for?’ he asked. ‘Well,’ said the commissary, hesitatingly, ‘it
is re-aromatised by the transforming hand of modern chemistry, and put
up in pound papers, which are decorated with attractive labels and
high-sounding names.’”
About ten years ago, when the question of coffee adulteration was much
agitated, I published a little treatise, entitled, “Coffee, as it is and
as it ought to be,” in which, among other particulars, I pointed out the
various sophistications practised. A compositor who was engaged in
printing the work furnished me with a remarkable statement in
confirmation of reports which I had previously heard.
He stated that in various parts of the metropolis, but more especially
in the east, are to be found liver bakers. These men take the livers of
oxen and horses, bake them, and grind them into a powder, which they
sell to the low-priced coffee-shop keepers, at from 4d. to 6d. per
pound; horse-liver coffee bearing the highest price. This adulterant may
be known by allowing the coffee to stand until cold, when a thick
pellicle or skin will be found on the top. It goes farther than coffee,
and is generally mixed with chicory and other vegetable imitations of
coffee.
According to the investigations of Dr. Hassall (“Food and its
Adulterations”), the several adulterations of coffee may be
distinguished by the following characters:
Chicory, by the size, form, and ready separation of the component cells
of the root, as well as by the presence of an abundance of spiral
vessels of the dotted form.
Roasted corn, by the size, form, and other characters of the starch
granules, of which the grains are principally composed. Beans, also, by
the form, &c., of the constituent granules of starch. Potato, by the
large size, rounded form, and ready separation of the cells of the
cellulose, as well as by the fibrous markings on their surfaces.
Plate 3 shows a fragment of roasted coffee as seen under the microscope,
magnified 140 diameters, and the structures in a sample of coffee
adulterated with chicory.
Dr. Normandy, in his evidence before the Parliamentary Committee on the
Adulteration of Food, &c., stated that he had met with roasted corn in
coffee to an extent of from 25 to 30 per cent.; it is recognised by the
size and character of the starch granules; consists of barley and rye,
and is generally very easy to detect; it floats up. If coffee has been
adulterated with roasted grain, when you pour boiling water upon it you
will see rising against the sides of the cup portions of the ground
grain, which you sometimes can separate in considerable quantities, by
capillary attraction. If you pour such coffee from the coffee-pot, some
of those grains will fall with the liquid in the cup, and they will
climb up, as it were, the sides of the cup a quarter of an inch, or
something of that kind, all round, and you can collect them very easily.
Dr. R. D. Thompson, F.R.S., another witness, stated that a large cargo
of lupins from Egypt having been imported, which could not be made any
use of in consequence of their bitter taste, he was asked to give a
certificate in favour of their being equal to coffee, but declined, and
recommended that, after steeping, to remove the bitter principle, they
should be sold for cattle. He also added that he had seen an ingenious
apparatus for making artificial coffee-berries from chicory and other
substances; it was something like a bullet-mould, and patented by
Messrs. Duckworth of Liverpool.
The chicory itself sold is not always pure. The Board of Inland Revenue
have found, on chemical examination in different samples, beans, rye,
oats (roasted and ground), caramel or burnt sugar, oxide of iron and
orange berries.
The principle contained in coffee, remarks Dr. Letheby, may be
considered as essential to life, inasmuch as all nations
[Illustration: Plate 3
Genuine Ground Coffee.]
[Illustration: Coffee Adulterated with Chicory.]
use it; it prevents the wear and tear of the body. Now there is nothing
in chicory which can do that. Chemically there is no difference between
beetroot chicory and what is called real chicory; microscopically you
can discover the difference. If genuine coffee is sprinkled upon the
surface of a tumbler of water, it remains a considerable time floating,
and when it sinks it only slightly colours the water; chicory, on the
other hand, sinks quickly, and colours the water very deeply. Ground
coffee is enveloped in an oily substance, which prevents the water
absorbing; chicory has no such protection, and sinks immediately.
Mr. Phillips, the chemist to the Inland Board of Revenue, states that
the average per-centage of chicory to coffee, when sold mixed, was found
to range from 20½ to 16¾ per cent.
At a recent meeting of the British Association of Science, Mr. Horsley
called attention to the use of bi-chromate of potash, in analysing
adulterated samples of coffee. With diluted solutions of pure coffee,
this salt produces an intense deep porter-brown coloration, whilst upon
decoctions of chicory no effect is produced. He advised the following
procedure: Take equal parts of chicory and coffee, and decoct them in
different quantities of water. Filter, bottle, and label the liquids.
Take a teaspoonful of the chicory, and dilute till it is of a brown
sherry colour; boil it in a porcelain dish, with a fragment of
crystallised bi-chrome. The colour will be scarcely deepened. If a
similarly diluted solution of coffee is thus treated, a deep-brown tinge
is obtained. By operating with mixed liquids a scale of colours may be
obtained indicating the properties of the two substances. If a few
grains of the sulphate of copper be added, both decoctions yield a
precipitate; that from chicory being a clay yellow, and that from coffee
a sepia brown. Mixed decoctions yield intermediate tints.