IRISH COFFEE
THAT RICH AND CREAMYTASTE...
Source: Speak Up
Language level: Upper intermediate
Speaker: Justin Ratcliffe
THE ART OF PERFECTION
Ireland is famous for whiskey, but have you ever tried Irish Coffee? It’s a wonderful mixture of coffee, whiskey and cream. It was originally invented in 1942 by a barman in Country Limerick in order to bring comfort to some stranded American tourists. And nearly 70 years later, it is still going strong.
One person who knows how to make a good Irish Coffee is 20-year-old Ruthie Coleman. She works in the Jasmine Bar at the Brooks Hotel in Dublin. The bar stocks more than 100 different types of whiskey and is rightly on the Ireland Whiskey Trail. We asked her to explain how to make the perfect Irish Coffee:
Ruthie Coleman
(Irish accent)
Either you use a Paris goblet or a latte glass. And or heat the glass first. And then you empty it out and get fresh boiling water. And then, according to the customer, you add sugar. Normally, it’s two sugars, but, if the customer doesn’t like a sweet coffee, you have to explain to them that the sugar actually makes the cream level on it, so…the Irish coffee needs a bit of sugar in it. An then once the sugar dissolves, then you add a shot of coffee, and then you add your shot of whiskey –Jameson whiskey is the one that we use – and you stir well until it’s dissolved. And then you use double cream and you shake it well, and then you use the back of a teaspoon and you pour it gently to make it settle on the top.
But, as she explains, sometimes things can go wrong!
Ruthie Coleman
Sometimes, if you don’t stir the Irish coffee well, the mixture of the sugar and the whiskey and the coffee isn’t mixed well, so you might get different tastes at different stages when you’re drinking it. Second, well, if the cream’s not shipped well, it mightn’t, first of all, get out onto the spoon, or the opposite way, if it’s not stirred enough, it might just float and go down to the bottom of the coffee, so that’s not good either. Cause the perfect taste of an Irish Coffee is through the cream, so the cram should always be at the top, so you taste the Irish whiskey through the cream.
