Since the passage of the Pure Food Law there has been a great improvement in conditions. Millions of labels reading "Java and Mocha" were destroyed, others were amended by such additions as rendered them permissible. The word "Blend" was for a time so employed as to give prominence to the legend "Mocha and Java" on mixtures in which beans of those two types must have felt hopelessly in the minority, but this also was checked by the rule that coffees named in blends must be given in the order of the proportions contained in the package.
This revolution will eventually prove of great advantage to the industry. The former methods tended to retard rather than advance the proper appreciation of coffee as a beverage, which will naturally follow consistent retailing of the differ ent varieties, grades and blends under inviolable titles. In many cases, the old style nomenclature was a distinct fraud on the purchaser by obtaining from him a higher price than the value of the beans. In others, where no fraud was intended and where the product was worth the price charged, the masquerade name at tached to it was a foolish following of trade traditions. The practice is entirely unnecessary, as the average coffee sold here is of good quality, well and cleanly prepared, quite worthy of sale under its own proper names.
In defense of the retailer and mer chants generally, it must be added that for generations they were in a majority of cases themselves victims of a world wide system of false naming and substi tution and that they only passed goods on as they received them and designated them the "same as others did." When the adulteration of coffee is practised, it is generally in the ground bean. Nearly every conceivable substitute has at some time been ground and roasted to a resemblance of coffee —among them rye, rice, holly berries, barley, acorns, beet-root, beans, peas, carrots, etc.
If Chicory is added without the knowledge or desire of the consumer, it is entitled to place as an adulterant, but it differs radically from the other articles mentioned as a great many people, especially in European countries, consider the addition of a certain percentage as an improve ment on the straight coffee ( see article on CHICORY) . Under the present the addition of Chicory must be announced on the label.
The average chemical composition of raw and roasted coffee is as follows : The liquid obtained by the ordinary brewing of the ground coffee contains how ever only unimportant percentages of components other than "Caffeine," which fur nishes its stimulating properties, etc.; "Caffeole," the chief aromatic principle produced
from the fat, oil, etc., by the roasting process, and "Caffeic acid," a secondary flavoring component. The sugar is converted into caramel in the roasting.
The coffee bean contains less stimulating property than the tea leaf, but, as more is used for making the beverage, the two liquids offer approximately the same stimulating power.
Some of the albumin and cellulose is dissolved in the brewed coffee, and a little food material is thus included in the beverage, but the amount is necessarily quite small. The bulk is left in the "grounds." The United States is the largest per capita consumer of coffee, the average con sumption being about twelve pounds a year.
Coffee Blending.
Blending is an important branch of the coffee business, but no exact rules can be laid down for its practice, as tastes differ in every country and often in different sec tions of the same country. The fundamental intent in high-class blends is to obtain a smooth, mellow, aromatic liquor, to add strength if too mild and to modify if too heavy. The genuine Mocha, for example, is a little too acid and the genuine Java generally not quite acid enough—hence the advantage of a blending of genuine Mocha and Java. In low grade blends, the aim is to make cheap, coarse beans palatable by adding a cer tain quantity of others of more pleasing flavor.
The best blends are obtained by roasting each type separately and then mixing and closing them up together immediately after—as old crop and new crop, or "mild" and "strong" beans require different lengths of time for the best results in roasting. If put in the cylinder to roast together, some are liable to be half raw while others are over-cooked.
Coffee Selection.
Long experience is essential to the training of a coffee expert. The chapters fol lowing on the different coffee growths give brief descriptions of the beans of the prin cipal varieties—but there are so many different kinds, so much alike and yet with so many minor differences of size, appearance, color and cup quality, that very few people can correctly judge the quality of a bean by its appearance raw—and only the keenest experts can determine its exact classification after roasting. The best test for the aver age merchant or consumer is by a sample infusion after roasting and grinding.