At the beginning of the 20th century, coffee was an elite drink. Coffee beans were imported to Polotsk from South-East Asia. The most common device for crushing large grains of coffee was a manual coffee grinder or a mill. It was a small box with a rotating handle and a slide-out drawer for a milled grain. Manual coffee grinders were often used in confectioneries and bakeries, where overseas drinks were sold. For example, in Polotsk in 1910 one could drink coffee, cocoa, taste chocolate in Bimbad's and Yakupov's bakeries on Vitebskaya street.
