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...
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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...
Health
Does chicory coffee raise blood sugar? What the inulin research actually shows
The question lands in my inbox at least once a week, usually from a reader who has just been diagnosed with prediabetes or who is tracking glucose with a con...
Health
Is decaf coffee bad for you? An honest read on the real concerns
A friend texted me last spring with a screenshot from an Instagram wellness account claiming that “decaf coffee is one of the worst things you can drink.” Sh...
Getting started
The best morning drink instead of coffee (from someone who's tried most of them)
I drank coffee every morning for nineteen years. Then for about eighteen months I didn’t. Then I started again. Then I cut back. Along the way I tried, in ro...
Recipes
How to brew chicory root: three methods I actually use
I’ll say the loud part first: chicory root is the best coffee alternative you can buy for under ten dollars. I’ve tried all of them — mushroom powders, carob...
Health
Herbal coffee vs decaf: which is actually right for you?
People lump them together — “coffee without the caffeine” — and then get confused when they don’t taste the same, or when the decaf still gives them heartbur...
Product roundups
Mushroom coffee vs regular coffee: the honest head-to-head
We get this question a lot: is mushroom coffee actually better than regular coffee, or is it a trend with good marketing? The answer, like a lot of things, i...
Product roundups
The Best Caffeine-Free Coffee Alternatives in 2026
If you’ve landed here, you’ve probably already figured out that “caffeine-free” is a bigger tent than it sounds. It includes the herbal blends that try to ta...
Product roundups
The Best Herbal Coffee in 2026: Caffeine-Free Picks That Actually Taste Like Coffee
Somewhere in year two of drinking herbal coffee daily, it stops being a substitute and starts being the thing itself. You stop comparing it to coffee. You st...
Product roundups
The Best Chicory Coffee in 2026: Tested and Ranked
Chicory coffee is one of those drinks that feels new to a lot of Americans and is, in fact, two centuries old. It was the workaround during the Continental B...
Product roundups
The Best Mushroom Coffee in 2026: An Honest Roundup
Somewhere between the third LinkedIn post about “brain fog” and the fourth Instagram ad for adaptogens, most of us have heard the pitch for mushroom coffee. ...
Health
Does mushroom coffee help anxiety? What the research actually shows
A couple of years ago, the big claim in the coffee-adjacent internet was that a morning cup could make you productive. Now the pitch has flipped. Every third...
Health
Can you drink mushroom coffee while pregnant?
When a pregnant client asks me whether they can drink mushroom coffee, there are really two questions tangled together: one about caffeine, and one about the...
Health
Is chicory coffee safe during pregnancy?
This question comes up in my clinical practice more than almost any other coffee-alternative question. Pregnant clients have usually already cut caffeine (or...
Getting started
What to drink during caffeine withdrawal
On day 2 of my first real attempt at quitting coffee, I poured myself a glass of water with lemon and stared at it like it had personally insulted me. The pr...
Health
Is caffeine withdrawal in the DSM? Yes — here's what that means
When I was reporting on addiction medicine a decade ago, I was surprised to learn that caffeine withdrawal was a formal diagnostic entity. I had thought of c...
Health
How long does caffeine withdrawal last? A day-by-day timeline
One of the most common questions I get from clients cutting caffeine is the most practical one: how long is this going to last?
Getting started
How to quit caffeine without the headache
I have quit caffeine four times. The first time was cold turkey, a Monday morning, and by Tuesday evening I had a headache so bad I thought I was getting the...