How To Make An Irish (Boozy) Coffee
It's Friday night, or late afternoon, or it's just been one of those days. This is the recipe for the Irish Coffee you've earned and proves how incredibly easy it can be to make tasty things.
Some things just work together. They might taste great on their own but then something about combining the ingredients creates a whole, greater than the sum of its parts, that's elevated to another level of taste. Irish Coffee is one such thing where coffee, whiskey and cream are just meant to be together.
As with lots of perfect pairings the trick here is balance. No one wants creamy whiskey with insipid coffee so you want to make sure your coffee brew is a little stronger than normal. Methods like cafetiere work really well to steep and pull every bit of flavour out of the coffee. You can also increase the body of your coffee by adjusting the brew ratio. If, for example, you make your cafetiere with around 60g of coffee per litre try upping this to 70 or even 75.
You can definitely experiment with different whiskeys and the flavour profile they impart but do try and avoid peated and smoky whiskeys as you'll find it more difficult to balance the flavour of coffee against such strong notes.
* pro tip - naturally processed coffees work super well here. Because of the fermentation they have a naturally bigger body and can have slight 'boozy' notes that compliment the drink perfectly.
Irish Coffee Recipe:
- 300ml of strong brewed coffee per serving (see above). This recipe makes two serves
- 100ml cream
- 30ml Sugar syrup (1 part sugar to 1 part water)
- 30-40ml of your favourite Irish Whiskey
- Get your coffee brewed strong at a slightly higher brew ratio than normal (use more coffee)
- Meanwhile mix 30-40ml of whiskey with the sugar syrup
- Pour the hot coffee into the whiskey and sugar mixture and stir well
- Pour 150ml into each serving glass
- Either shake to aerate first or pour cream vey slowly over the back of a spoon to ensure the cream sits on top rather than mixing straight into the drink.
- Serve hot and enjoy
FAQs
What Alcohol Is in Irish Coffee?
Irish whiskey of course! If you want to get really into it though we've had some of the best Irish Coffees of our life when different whiskeys have been combined to create a more complex and unique taste profile.
How to make whipped cream for Irish Coffee
You want whipping cream or double cream here as single cream doesn't have enough fat to 'whip' up. Also make sure any cream is cold and the bowl you're cold too when you begin whipping it. Heat is just going to make things runny.
Then you can either use a whisk to whip by hand or a hand/ standing mixer.
We recommend light whipping to keep the cream drinkable and not too stiff.
Even a good shake (in a cocktail shaker, or similar) can actually be enough to get a nice bit of air into the cream without losing the drinkable texture.
