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Drink

Wisdom Coffee

A coffee-like beverage made from roasted barley, wheat, rye, and a coffee blend, served hot with fresh cream.

From an old cookbook · modernised transcription
From a historical cookbook (Internet Archive) · 6 ingredients
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Why it works: Wheat and rye match in chemistry and in kitchens. They rank in the top 1% of all ingredient pairs, and cooks put them together in 404 recipes. Both carry coumarin, which smells sweet, hay. The science ↓

Wisdom Coffee

Ingredients

Directions

Prepare the blend

  1. Roast the barley, wheat, and rye until brown.

  2. Use 3 tablespoons of the blend for 1 quart of water.

Brew

  1. Place a flannel cloth or two layers of cheesecloth over a pot.

  2. Add the finely-ground cereal to the cloth and pour 1 cup of boiling water over it.

  3. Let it stand for 1 minute, then pour the remaining boiling water on top.

  4. Cover tightly and set over a small fire for 1 minute without boiling.

  5. Once all the water has passed through the grounds, remove the cloth and discard the dregs.

Serve

  1. Serve the hot coffee immediately, pouring it over fresh cream.

Recipe from a historical cookbook (Internet Archive).

Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much their aromas overlap, and how often cooks already put them together.

  1. Wheat + ryetop 1% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together404 recipes

    Shared aroma: coumarin (sweet, hay).

  2. Barley + wheattop 3% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together185 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, fruity).

  3. Barley + ryetop 4% of all pairs
    Smell alikestrong
    Cooked together66 recipes

    Shared aroma: isoamyl acetate (banana, pear).

  4. Barley + coffeetop 14% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together30 recipes

    Shared aroma: 2-furfurylthiol (coffee, roasted).

  5. Wheat + coffeetop 16% of all pairs
    Smell alikemoderate
    Cooked together105 recipes

    Shared aroma: beta-damascenone (apple, rose).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Whole barley
Roasting browns the grain and gives the brew its coffee-like roasted flavour.
Wheat
Roasting browns the grain and adds toasty, roasted flavour to the brew.
Rye
Roasting browns the grain and adds a slightly bitter, toasted flavour.
Coffee blend
Supplies the coffee aroma and flavour that the roasted cereals alone do not provide.

The step that matters

Covering and heating without boiling. Boiling over the grounds can scorch the roasted cereal and turn the brew bitter, so the pot should be kept just below a boil while it steeps.

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.

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