Coffee the Australian way

As my son has a project this term to do with the Australian gold rush, we've been looking together at paintings and illustrations of the era on the internet. (He's doing a diorama, and as much as it is supposed to be his project, I actually would love to get in and build the little shops and tents myself.)

One of things I noticed was that several paintings and drawings of era indicate that coffee was popular in the gold fields, with shops and tents advertising it prominently. This surprised me, since, as a child, tea seemed to well and truly dominate household drinking habits, at least until the 1970's. (Maybe coffee was bigger in the more European influenced cities of Melbourne and Sydney; I'm talking Brisbane experience here, and not even near Italian influenced New Farm.)

As it turns out, the coffee shops of gold rush settlements were often not what they seemed:

....despite the government’s attempt to enforce prohibition on the goldfields, liquor was never in short supply. Willian Howitt’s description of the vestiges of its consumption at Ballarat reinforce Clacy’s view: ‘... bottles broken and whole lie about in such quantities, that it is wonderful how horses go anywhere on the field without getting lamed.’

Transport costs and the need to conceal the alcohol meant the illegal supply was restricted to spirits. Sly-grog sellers found ingenious ways to advertise and dispense their goods. ‘Coffee shops’ or ‘coffee tents’, and less often ‘lemonade sellers’, were common euphemisms for sly grog shops. The prohibition was on the sale of alcohol so, to get around the law, a general storekeeper might make a ‘present’ of a tipple and charge extra for another item on the bill. A couple of ‘hugely fat’ female grog-sellers were well remembered for their enterprising ways – they strapped tin containers to their waists (underneath their clothes) and dispensed brandy from tubes poking out the side of their skirts.

Well, that explains the enthusiasm for the "coffee" outlets.

The grog sold could have quite a kick:

The liquor supplied by sly-grog sellers on the diggings was commonly adulterated. In 1853, a government inquiry found that the ‘brandy’ sold on the fields was half cheap spirit and half additives. Water was commonly used to dilute alcohol, but tobacco was often used as a base to give the grog extra kick. Pharmaceutical spirits, opium and even cayenne pepper were also reported additives.

That reminds me of the My Coffee episode of Scrubs, when the janitor (taking a job as a barista) invents a new drink:

“The two most addictive substances on earth are caffeine and nicotine... Behold... Smoke-accino!”

On coffee in Australian history generally, I didn't know this:

....coffee has been grown in Australia since 1832 when a small planting was established at Kangaroo Point in Brisbane.

By the 1880’s, coffee was grown in northern New South Wales and along the Queensland coast as far north as Cooktown. The most extensive area under plantation was then, as now, concentrated in Tropical North Queensland.

By 1900, 50-60 farmers in the Cairns region were collectively producing 40% of our young nation's coffee supply. Many early pioneers won international recognition in Europe for the Australian bean. Unfortunately by 1926 the industry slipped into decline and until the 1980's only small plantings had survived.

Isn't it funny how things go in and out of fashion...