Page:The White House Cook Book.djvu/498

 COFFEE, TEA, BEVERAGES.



BOILING water is a very important desideratum in the making of a cup of good coffee or tea, but the average housewife is very apt to overlook this fact. Do not boil the water more than three or four minutes; longer boiling ruins the water for coffee or tea making, as most of its natural properties escape by evaporation, leaving a very insipid liquid composed mostly of lime and iron, that would ruin the best coffee, and give the tea a dark, dead look, which ought to be the reverse.

Water left in the tea-kettle over night must never ~be used for pre- paring the breakfast coffee; no matter how excellent your coffee or tea may be, it will be ruined by the addition of water that has been boiled more than once.

THE HEALING PROPERTIES OF TEA AND COFFEE.

THE medical properties of these two beverages are considerable. Tea is used advantageously in inflammatory diseases and as a cure for the headache. Coffee is supposed to act as a preventative of gravel and gout, and to its influence is ascribed the rarity of those diseases in France and Turkey. Both tea and coffee powerfully coun- teract the effects of opium and intoxicating liquors; though, when taken in excess, and without nourishing food, they themselves produce, temporarily at least, some of the more disagreeable consequences inci- dent to the use of ardent spirits. In general, however, none but per- sons possessing great mobility of the nervous system, or enfeebled or effeminate constitutions, are injuriously affected by the moderate use of tea and coffee in connection with food.

COFFEE.

ONE full coffeecupful of ground coffee, stirred with one egg and part of the shell, adding a half cupful of cold water. Put it into the

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