Ingredients
Adaptogens vs mushrooms: what's the difference, really?
A reader emailed me last month asking why every mushroom-coffee bag in her cupboard called itself “adaptogenic” while the bottle of ashwagandha in her medici...
Independent editorial · since 2025
Your honest guide to life beyond coffee.
Mushroom coffees, chicory, herbal roasts, matcha, and everything people try when regular coffee stops working for them. We test every drink, read the studies, and won't tell you your favorite brand is best if it isn't.
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Health
Chicory coffee and IBS: what the FODMAP research says about your gut and your morning cup
I see the same question in clinic three or four times a month. A patient sits down, pulls out a bag of chicory coffee, and asks why something so frequently r...
Product roundups
Is Four Sigmatic worth it? An honest review of the mushroom-coffee mainstay
Four Sigmatic has been around long enough that it’s no longer the underdog. When we started covering mushroom coffee, Four Sigmatic was the brand readers had...
Recipes
How to make a chicory latte: 6 recipes from classic to iced
I get asked about chicory lattes more than any other drink on this site. Some people want a creamy caffeine-free morning ritual, some are tapering off coffee...
Ingredients
What is carob coffee? The pod, the powder, and how it gets in your mug
The first time I tried carob coffee, I had no idea what I was tasting. The mug looked like coffee. The smell was warm and faintly cocoa-like but not quite ch...
Recent reviews
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Reviews
Teeccino French Roast review: the closest-to-coffee herbal coffee we've tried
I have reviewed a lot of herbal coffees. Most of them disappoint in the same way: they’re reasonable herbal drinks, but they taste nothing like coffee, and m...
Reviews
Ryze Mushroom Coffee review: lower caffeine, real mushrooms, fair price
Ryze is currently the best-selling direct-to-consumer mushroom coffee in the US. It’s worth evaluating on its own terms rather than on the marketing-adjacent...
Reviews
MUD\WTR Rise review: the best-tasting mushroom coffee we've tried
We tested MUD\WTR Rise against three other mushroom coffees (Ryze, Four Sigmatic, Om) in a blind taste panel. MUD\WTR won on taste by a clear margin. It was ...
Why we write this site
Most of us end up on a coffee-alternatives search because something changed: a bad night of sleep, a new medication, a pregnancy, a health scare, or just the creeping sense that the fourth cup isn't doing what the first one used to. The web has plenty of listicles selling the alternatives — far fewer that help you understand them.
We write for the reader in the middle of it: tired, curious, a little skeptical, looking for someone who's actually tried the thing and can say whether it lives up to the claims. We include the products we think are worth trying, we disclose the ones we earn a commission on, and we never rank something first because of a payout.