Coffee shops have become ubiquitous around the world. What better way to know some history about them than now… so here are some interesting anecdotes that depict the coffee world in a new light.
- Coffee was first known in Europe as Arabian Wine.
- Milk as an additive to coffee became popular in the 1680’s, when a French physician recommended that cafe au lait be used for medicinal purposes.
- Bach wrote a coffee cantata in 1732
- The heavy tea tax imposed on the colonies in 1773, which caused the “Boston Tea Party,” resulted in America switching from tea to coffee. Drinking coffee was an expression of freedom.
- The founding fathers of the U.S., during the revolution, formed their national strategies in coffeehouses.
- In 1900, coffee was often delivered door-to-door in the United States, by horse-pulled wagons.
- Turkish bridegrooms were once required to make a promise during their wedding ceremonies to always provide their new wives with coffee. If they failed to do so, it was grounds for divorce!
- Ugandans mix green beans with sweet grasses and various spices, dry them, and then wrap these in grass packets, which were then hung in their homes. It serves as talisman and as decoration.
- In the ancient Arab world, coffee became such a staple in family life that one of the causes allowed by law for marital separation was a husband’s refusal to produce coffee for his wife.
- Raw coffee beans, soaked in water and spices, are chewed like candy in many parts of Africa.
- Beethoven who was a coffee lover, was so particular about his coffee that he always counted 60 beans each cup when he prepared his brew.
- When coffee supplies became scarce during the American Civil War, soldiers desperate for a cup of coffee used roasted sweet potato and Indian corn as a substitute!