164 COFFEE. 



BAD COFFEE IN THE RESTAURANTS. 



To THE Editor of the Herald : 



Please call the attention of the Board of Health to the article (bad coffee) 



served in city restaurants. It is damaging to the constitution of man, and 



should not be allowed to be sold. 



E. K. Young. 



The fact is, at very few, if any, of the average eating-houses, 

 or restaurants, can a person procure a cup of unadulterated coffee. 

 And in the vast majority of poorer households, the stuff which 

 they purchase and use under the name of coffee is merely a com- 

 pound of extraneous substances which have nothing in common 

 with coffee but the color when roasted and ground. 



The following statement occurs in a copy of the SdenUfio 

 American, published toward the close of our late war : 



"The editor of the Baltimore Americcm lately visited the 

 commissary department of one of the large military hospitals, and 

 noticed several barrels of dried coffee-grounds, the purpose where- 

 of 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 commis- 

 sary, hesitatingly, ' it is re- aromatized by the transforming hand 

 of modern chemistry, and put up in packages, which are decorated 

 with attractive labels and high-sounding names.' " 



The principal adulterants, however, now resorted to in this 

 cotmtry, as before stated, are chicory and roasted rye and peas. 

 These ingredients are palmed off in vast quantities on the Ameri- 

 can coffee-drinker. 



All of the so-called patent or proprietary ground coffees, 

 which in various styles of showy packages and under seductive 

 titles are commended to the consumer, consist of nothing but a 

 mixture of those adulterants (chiefly rye and peas) with more or 

 less of the genuine substance. 



The high prices which have prevailed in the coffee market 

 since 1871, and which are given in another chapter, have greatly 

 stimulated the adulteration of coffee in the United States. The 

 American Grocer of April 29, 1876, commenting on the general 

 question of the coffee-supply, remarks : 



