Healthy Coffee Substitute: Daisy's Chicory and Dandelion Blend

Many people try to quit coffee and go back within days. The taste and the morning ritual are hard to give up. Daisy says she quit and returned to caffeinated coffee many times, until she built a blend that tastes like coffee without the caffeine. After a lot of trial and error, she says it settled the tiredness, bloating, acidity and anxiety that coffee had caused her in less than a month.

Why Daisy gave up caffeinated coffee

Daisy describes coffee as pressing the gas pedal while the handbrake is still on. In her words, the morning cup does not give energy, it hides fatigue. She links it to feeling tired, bloated, stressed, anxious, acidic, inflamed and dehydrated.

Her blend brews and tastes like coffee, she says. Her favourite version is like strong, heavy South Indian filter coffee. She says it restores energy, settles digestion and keeps her focused through the day. You can change the ratio to suit your own taste.

What goes into the blend

Daisy chose each ingredient for a reason.

• Chicory powder. This is the base, and it smells like coffee. She says chicory is about 68% inulin, a fibre that feeds good gut bacteria. She also says it eases constipation and helps the body make bile, which supports the liver.
• Chickpeas. Roasted dark, they add a little extra protein to the morning cup.
• Dandelion root. When roasted, it turns dark, bitter and chocolatey, close to coffee. She calls it a liver tonic that helps the liver make bile. She says it is traditionally used for digestion, so while caffeine disrupts digestion, dandelion heals it.
• Reishi mushroom. Traditional Chinese medicine used it as an anti-ageing food and called it the mushroom of immortality, she says. Daisy uses it to handle stress better. She says it calms an overactive immune system and wakes up a lazy one.
• Date seeds. She tells you not to throw these away. She says their antioxidant score (ORAC) is higher than green tea, and that they support the liver and kidneys.
• Barley. Used in a small amount, it adds its own benefits.

How to make the coffee powder

Daisy made a small trial batch for the video. She dry roasts the chickpeas, date seeds and barley until dark brown, then powders them together very fine. She buys chicory powder ready-made. She also used a ready-made dandelion and reishi powder mix, which she roasted briefly.

Mix everything into one jar of powder. Quantities are in the recipe card above.

How to brew it

Use the powder as you would filter coffee. Make a decoction in a traditional Indian filter, or in a gas filter if that is easier where you live. Or stir it into hot milk like instant coffee, then strain it through fine muslin or a strainer so no sediment is left.

You can drink it black, or add milk and sweetener. Daisy whirls it in a frother. She says it has a rich flavour with a calming effect, not a jittery one.

Who should be careful

Daisy gives one clear warning. She says this coffee may not suit extremely thin, lean, hyperactive, sensitive people. In Ayurveda this is the vata type, the air-and-space body type. Because the recipe uses many dry-roasted ingredients, she says it can aggravate their symptoms.

She says medium-build, athletic or broad-framed, heavier people can gain more from it. She has a separate video on balancing vata.

Making the switch from coffee

Daisy says her old habit was about taste and flavour, not only the caffeine. For that reason, she built the blend to smell, brew and taste like the coffee she loved. She suggests starting with the ratios in the recipe card, then adjusting them. If you like a stronger cup, change the amounts until it suits you.

The recipe is flexible. She invites you to share your mixes, your ratios, what you added or removed, and whether your coffee-related symptoms eased. That way, others can learn from your trials.

What research says

Research on the blend as a whole is missing, so these notes cover single ingredients. In a small trial of 44 constipated adults, chicory inulin raised stool frequency, compared with placebo. The dose was 12 g of purified inulin a day for four weeks. A cup of coffee substitute will not necessarily give that much.

A 2022 review says dandelion has long been used for digestive problems and lists compounds, including inulin, being studied for gut protection.

For reishi, a Cochrane review found that the few small trials in people with type 2 diabetes did not support its use for heart-health risk factors. A lab study of date seed drinks found that darker roasting lowered the antioxidant content. So a lighter roast may keep more of it.

Daisy’s tips

• Roast the chickpeas, date seeds and barley until dark brown, and grind them very fine.
• Strain a milk-based brew well, so the powder does not leave sediment.
• Change the ratios to your taste, then share your mixes with others.
• If you are thin, restless and very sensitive, be cautious, as she advises.

Daisy shows the whole recipe in the video above. It takes under seven minutes.