A New Table Drink from London

A “true trio” is two different shaped, porcelain cups (one for coffee and one for tea) and one matching saucer. This set is circa 1840s. True trios were sold in this manner, as a consumer would conceivably need only need one saucer, as the coffee and tea would not be drunk simultaneously. Etiquipedia has not yet found if a specific gilded age, “coffee-tea” cup was ever invented. 

Coffee-tea, a beverage made from the leaves of the coffee shrub, is a new candidate for popular favor, and would seem to have some advantages over the berry. It has not yet reached this country, save as a chance curiosity, but was recently brought under the notice of the Royal Botanic Society of London. The samples of coffee-tea, or prepared coffee leaves, were grown in the society's conservatory. 

The secretary said it had been estimated that the percentage of theine in the leaves of coffee was 1.26 as against 1.00 in the beans. As the leaves may be easily grown in many parts of the world where it is difficult to insure good crops of coffee beans, he thought it might prove a valuable agricultural product in many warm colonies. At present, he said, only some two millions of men use coffee-tea, in comparison with 110 millions who use the bean, and 500 millions who drink Chinese and Indian tea. — Good Housekeeping Magazine, 1892

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