Are there any comparable seeds that can be turned into drinks or products like cacao seeds?
I should’ve elaborated, I meant a hot drink made from ground plantstuff that isn’t tea leaves. I’m aware nut milk of various kinds already exists but nut milk is made from the nuts being soaked in water for a long time, not being ground, then put in hot water.
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Plant stuffs that isn’t (tea) leaves turned into beverages…
Let’s see:
How about rosehip fruit and apple peels or hibiscus flowers, butterfly pea flowers and chamomille flowers turned into beverages? Licorice root is an ingredient in quite a few tea mixtures, same with willow bark and sometimes cinnamon bark. Fennel, caraway and aniseed infusion is a staple for young mothers and toddlers over here when they feel gassy.
Beer is a cold drink, but it’s made from the fruit of the hop plant and grains. The process is a bit more complex than merely grinding and soaking them in hot water, though.
Cola is a cold drink, too – but it boils down, after all, to a heavily sweetened and carbonated infusion of many, many fruit and spice extracts, such as lime and lemon essential oil, kola nut, vanilla bean, cinnamon bark, clove buds, nutmeg etc.
Ginger beer and ginger ale come to my mind, coming from the ginger root. Also tasty as a hot drink if you have a cold: ginger slices boiled in water, flavoured with lemon juice and honey.
Where coffee beans weren’t available, people tried making it from dried chicory root or even oaks, and malt.
And finally… celery root, carrots, leek or onions finely chopped and boiled make a nice vegetable stock.
Oh, and nut or soy or oat milk IS made with the dried seed of said plant, finely ground and steeped in boiling water. In case of soy milk, however, it needs further processing, else the resulting concoction is slimy and bitter.
If you limit the leaves strictly to tea leaves, there’s still honeybush, rooibos, mint, mate and a shitload of other herbal teas and infusions enjoyed around the world.
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