Evans - Cooking with coffee: brewing up sweet and savory everyday dishes

Skyhorse and Skyhorse Publishing are registered trademarks of Skyhorse Publishing, Inc., a Delaware corporation. Visit our website at www.skyhorsepublishing.com. 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available on file. Cover design by Rain Saukas Cover photo credit Brandi Evans Print ISBN: 978-1-63450-223-8 Ebook ISBN: 978-1-5107-0058-1 Printed in China For my readers and friends, thank you for all your
support and encouragement along the way. And
most of all, for Nick and Aldenmy two best
reasons for drinking even more coffee. INTRODUCTION My name is Brandi, and I love coffee.

Of course, youre looking at a cookbook devoted completely to recipes using coffee, so Im sure youve figured that out by now. Ive been cooking up a storm and blogging/writing about what my husband and I eat for more than six years now on my blog BranAppetit (www.branappetit.com), and Im so excited to be bringing these coffee recipes to you! I was born and raised in Virginia and currently live in the mountains of southwest Virginia with my husband, son, Brittany Spaniel, and two cats. While we eat well now, I didnt know how to cook anything when we got married eleven years ago. After a few years of struggling in the kitchen, I decided to get serious and learn to cook. Thanks to lots of cooking shows, cookbooks, and food blogs, I slowly taught myself how to make our favorite dishes and family recipes and eventually started working on creating recipes of my own. I now create new recipes for my blog and do recipe development and testing for national brands and publications.

But youre here for the food, right? So lets get to it. I wanted this book to be more than just recipes, and thats exactly what it is! From the history of coffee to picking your brewing method and the recipes themselves, this book has it all. Because my husband and I got serious (and a little nerdy) about our coffee methods at home, I want to pass on what weve learned throughout the past few years so you can make your best cup of coffee at home, too! We can definitely get a good cup of coffee in some shops nearby, but being able to make a perfectly brewed cup of joe in the morning is pretty nice knowledge to possess. Plus, it makes our morning routine even more enjoyable. Coffee has been shown to have great health benefits, but most people still only use it in its most common form: brewed as a hot drink in the morning. Dont stop there, though! Coffee adds such an intense depth of flavor to other sweet and savory dishes that it should be a pantry staple for everyone.

Because the roasting process and origin of the beans offer such a wide range of flavors and undertones, theres a coffee bean you can use in just about any dish. From drinks to desserts to grilled meats, coffee adds a punch to anything youre cooking. As a self-taught cook, I try my best to make recipes and instructions simple and easy to follow. I hope you enjoy learning more about coffee and trying out some new recipes in your own kitchen! A Brief History of the Brew Not surprisingly, coffee is one of the most valuable traded commodities in the world. People love it! We rely on it, and, as a country, we drink it in massive quantities. It is estimated that more than two billion cups of coffee are consumed each day worldwideeach and every day! Drinking coffee is a daily ritual in the lives of millions of humans around the globe.

But where and when exactly did this habit begin? Like most foods that have been around for hundreds of years, the origin of coffee is somewhat folkloric. According to a popular Ethiopian legend, coffee was discovered by a goat herder named Kaldi, who found his goats running around, full of energy, after eating the red berries from the coffee trees. He tried the berries for himself and had a similar reaction. After witnessing this strange behavior, a monk took some of the berries back to his fellow monks; they too spent the night awake and alert. Before coffee became our morning beverage of choice, it was used in all kinds of preparations. In its most unprocessed form, coffee is a tiny, cherrylike fruit that becomes red when ripe.

The coffee bean itself is found in the center of the red berry. Early after its discovery, the berries were mixed with fat to create protein-rich snacks. The fermented pulp was used to make winelike mixtures. Another drink that appeared around AD 1000 was made from the whole coffee fruit, including the beans and the hull. It wasnt until the thirteenth century, however, that people began to roast coffee beans, which is the first step in the process of making coffee as we know it, as a drink. The modern version of roasted coffee began in Arabia, where, during the thirteenth century, coffee was extremely popular with the Muslim community for its ability to keep worshippers awake.

The Arabians found ways of controlling the beans and their productivity, essentially cornering the market. Apparently, not a single coffee plant existed outside of Arabia or Africa until the 1600s when Baba Budan left with beans strapped across his belly. The beans he carried out of the country lead to a new and competitive European coffee trade. In 1616, the Dutch founded the first European-owned coffee estate in Sri Lanka. The French began growing coffee in the Caribbean, followed by the Spanish in Central America and the Portuguese in Brazil. European coffeehouses popped up in Italy and France, where they gained traction.

Now, in America and many other countries, it is routine to stop in a coffee shop for a cup in the morning or later for a midday pick-me-upor both. Although coffee plants reached the New World during the eighteenth century, coffee the drink itself wasnt really popular until the Boston Tea Party of 1773, when changing from tea to coffee became a patriotic symbol. The Civil War and other conflicts that followed also helped to increase coffee consumption, as people relied on the caffeine for energy. Teddy Roosevelt himself is counted among Americas great coffee drinkers due to his (rumored) consumption of a gallon of coffee a day! By the late 1800s, coffee had become not only a nationwide, but a worldwide commodity and people started looking for ways to profit from it. In 1864, John and Charles Arbuckle, brothers from Pittsburgh, bought Jabez Burnss newly invented coffee bean roaster. The Arbuckle brothers sold pre-roasted coffee by the pound.

It wasnt long before James Folger followed and began selling coffee as well. These three men helped blazed the trail for several other big-name coffee producers, including Maxwell House and Hills Brothers. Now, of course, the country is overrun with Starbucks on every corner, Dunkin Donuts, and hundreds of local coffee shops across the world. Benefits of Coffee Coffee isnt just a delicious way to start your morning. Like most other whole foods, coffee boasts a variety of health benefits. Did you know that coffee is the most widely consumed source of antioxidants in the United States? Its true! And while coffee has some great benefits, it follows the same reasoning as anything else: moderation is key.