How to Make Cowboy Coffee
Make your own cowboy coffee following this traditional process.
Americans love coffee. These days, we are drinking more coffee than ever, and show no signs of slowing down. While our modern coffee industry is complicated and the products are luxury in nature, this hasn’t always been the case. Not long ago, coffee was a simpler affair than the double mochachino triple latte caramel drizzle drinks people swallow today. In some ways, our coffee culture is a reflection of modern America. While many people flock to businesses like Starbucks for their morning java, there seems to be a group of people interested in more traditional methods of making coffee. Perhaps that’s why a Google search of “Cowboy Coffee” will return more than 80 million results. For one reason or another, people are curious about this classic American drink.
If you are reading History of the West with Sam Payne: Trail to Cheyenne, you are probably to the point where Sam has been introduced to the crew. He also has his first meeting with the camp cook named Smoke. As in many scenes, coffee is mentioned as part of life on the drive. The regularity of coffee on the drive is backed up by primary sources. Here are just a few primary sources referencing cowboy coffee.
Andy Adams - Log of a Cowboy
“On Fox's suggestion the Mexican corporal brought up his wagon and corralled his horses as we had done, when his cook, to our delight, invited all to have coffee before starting. That cook won our everlasting regards, for his coffee was delicious. We praised it highly, whereupon the corporal ordered the cook to have it at hand for the men in the intervals between crossing the different bunches of cattle.”
Charles Siringo - A Texas Cowboy
“Our crowd consisted of fifteen men, one hundred head of ponies — mostly wild ones — and a chuck wagon loaded down with coffee, flour, molasses and salt.”
Charles Goodnight - Charles Goodnight: Cowman and Plainsman
“The wagon advanced to the lead and the cook served stong, black coffee as each hand rode by,…”
Early in the cattle drive period before 1870, cowboy coffee was made as it had always been on the frontier. Green coffee beans were roasted, ground on site, and then thrown in the pot of boiling water. This method is described by Philip Ashton Rollins in his 1922 book The Cowboy:
“If, as was usually the case, the camp's coffee were un ground, its beans were mashed on a rock with the butt of a pistol. The resultant mixture of vegetable and mineral substances was set aside until the frying - pan should have cooked, first, bread and, next, bacon…When (the food) had been fried, the pan was rapped against a rock or tree, to expel such of the grease as readily would leave, and then received a charge of water and the coffee - gravel mixture. When the boiling fluid was fairly well covered with fat melted from the utensil's sides, the dose-like beverage was ready for consumption.”
Primitive methods like this were common on the frontier. Sometimes, chuckwagons had a coffee grinder mounted to avoid having to mash the beans with a revolver, but all coffee had to be roasted.
Two brothers, John and Charles Arbuckle, thought there had to be a better way. After the Civil War, the two brothers began experimenting with methods of roasting coffee beans and packaging them for storage. Eventually, they hit on a recipe that would coat the roasted beans and seal in the flavor. After that, it was a matter of getting the coffee to the people who needed it, and the famous Arbuckles’ Coffee was born. After its introduction, Arbuckles’ Coffee became synonymous with coffee on the range.
If you’re interested in learning how to make your own cowboy coffee, there are plenty of resources to learn from. Perhaps the best is cowboy Ken Rollins. Rollins is an accomplished cook, cowboy, as well as a historian. He routinely references history, cookies, and the trail drive days in his videos. If you are interested in the process, I’d recommend watching his video.
Hopefully, this article has helped you better understand the history of cowboy coffee in the 1800s. Despite the way coffee is changing in the modern world, there are still a few of us who enjoy a more simple approach. Sticking with tradition, we like our coffee strong and black. Author J. Evetts Haley noted that until his death Charles Goodnight drank coffee that “would have put the Red River on rise.” Despite all the fancy lavishness a company like Starbucks can provide, the taste of good old-fashioned black coffee is something many people still enjoy.
