Ingredients · Other
Chicory
Cichorium intybus · Asteraceae (daisy family)
What it’s like, and how to use it
How to use it
Simmered or steeped long — it is a root and needs more than a green tea's patience. Blended with coffee in the New Orleans manner, or used alone as a caffeine-free dark cup. It is genuinely bitter, so it takes milk and sugar well.
With food
Cream and milk. Chocolate. Caramel. Beignets and pastry. Molasses. Gingerbread.
With spices
Cinnamon and ginger. Cardamom. Vanilla. Cloves.
With tea
Rooibos. Pu-erh. Roasted teas like hojicha. Dandelion root, its traditional partner.
Its story
Where it comes from
Native to Europe, North Africa and western Asia, now spread worldwide. Our lot names no origin.
What happened
Chicory's history is a history of blockades. It appeared as an adulterant in coffee, or a substitute for it, during the Napoleonic era, when the Continental System cut Europe off from colonial imports. And it stuck in New Orleans for the same reason: Louisianans began adding chicory root to their coffee when Union naval blockades during the American Civil War cut off the port — and they never stopped, which is why café au lait there still tastes the way it does. The inulin was only understood later: around 1970 it was recognised that the root contains up to 20 per cent of it, and it is now used commercially as a sweetener and a dietary fibre. The plant itself is the blue flower along a summer roadside, blooming from March to October.
On the shelf with it
Every product it goes into.
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Gingerbread Spice
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