Ersatz Coffee and Brown Bread: A Taste of Survival
“We had enough to live, but never enough to forget.”
In Bones of the Moth, food is more than sustenance—it’s signal. A slice of stale bread, a spoonful of watery soup, or the bitter taste of ersatz coffee speaks volumes about a world unraveling and then struggling to rethread itself. Set in occupied Germany in the summer of 1945, the novel brushes up constantly against hunger—not just for calories, but for stability, comfort, even the memory of normalcy.
So what did people eat after the war, when normal no longer existed?
What Is Ersatz Coffee?
The word ersatz means substitute. During and after the war, real coffee was nearly impossible to obtain in Germany. Instead, people brewed roasted grains, chicory root, acorns, sugar beets, or even ground-up turnips. It was a drink in name only, bitter and black, but warm—and that was sometimes enough.
In the novel, Otto refuses to drink it. He’s reached his limit of swallowing what’s false. But for many, ersatz coffee was the last ritual they could cling to: a morning cup, a moment of pretend.
Want to try it? Here's a basic version of wartime "coffee":
☕ Ersatz Coffee Recipe (Adapted)
Survival Style — Not for the faint of palate
2 tbsp roasted barley or chicory root (or a mix of both)
Optional: a pinch of roasted dandelion root for added bitterness
2 cups boiling water
Instructions:
Lightly roast your barley and chicory in a dry pan until dark brown and aromatic (but not burnt).
Simmer in boiling water for 10–15 minutes.
Strain through a fine sieve or cheesecloth.
Sip and imagine the absence of sugar, cream, or choice.
Bread as Memory, Bread as Survival
Bread was heavily rationed. Whole families survived on government-issued "brown bread"—a coarse, dense loaf made from whatever flour could be scavenged: rye, barley, oats, sometimes stretched with sawdust or potato starch.
In Bones of the Moth, brown bread appears on the table like a relic. It’s broken into slices, dipped in weak broth, used to absorb the space where butter used to be. To the modern eye, it seems tragic. But to the characters, it was life—and proof of still being alive.
A modest, postwar-style brown bread recipe:
🍞 Brown Bread of the Rubble Years (Modern Pantry Version)
2 cups rye flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp salt
2 tsp dry yeast
1 ½ cups warm water
Optional: a splash of molasses for authenticity (and morale)
Instructions:
Mix flours and salt. Dissolve yeast in warm water and let sit 5 minutes.
Combine, knead until elastic, and let rise 1 hour.
Shape into a round, let rise again for 30 mins.
Bake at 375°F (190°C) for about 40–50 minutes.
Serve thinly sliced. No butter. Maybe pickled beets if you’re lucky.
What Scarcity Teaches Us
Scarcity isn't just physical—it’s emotional. It teaches you to measure. To ration feeling. To stretch dignity across the hours like soup across hungry mouths.
But scarcity also carves space for memory. A crust of bread becomes sacred. A meal becomes ceremony. Even the bitterest ersatz coffee becomes a ritual of resilience.
In the novel, food anchors the characters to the reality they can’t escape—and to the past they can’t return to. It’s one of the quiet ways the war lingers in the body, long after the guns have stopped.
“Hunger is not just the absence of food. It’s the ache for what used to be enough.”