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I walk into the bar at the Hotel Metropole, it's a busy night and some of the patrons are in the middle of the floor displaying their skills at the jitterbug, the others are laughing, talking and smoking. Everyone is having fun, the war has been left behind and boom times are happening. An old friend approaches me with a dark looking drink in his hand. "What are you drinking tonight Harry?" I ask him.

"It's called a Black Russian old thing, you must have one." He steers me towards the bar.
"What on earth is a Black Russian?"
"Old Gustave here created it for your ambassador last night, I thought you'd have been here. Gustave a Black Russian for my friend pop it on my tab will you? it's quite nice you know," he continued as he turned to me.

So I tasted the strange drink and it was very smooth, I had watched the barman Gustave Tops mix it and he used 2 parts vodka to 1 part coffee liquor poured it over ice and gave it a quick stir.

Fast forward 50 years and my grandchildren are drinking these cocktails, along with a number of others made with similar ingredients, although my granddaughter talks about preferring a Tall Black Russian. This is when she tops her glass up with coke (an abomination in my eyes), apparently the sweetness of the coke combined with the coffee liquor is really something or other which I take to mean good.

My daughter always preferred White Russians, but then she always has milk in her coffee as well. A White Russian is when you take your delicious Black Russian and dilute it with cream or milk or if you can't decide which to use, you use something called half'n'half.

Now after dinner I do take a Russian Coffee on occasion usually birthdays or other family celebrations, I think of it as a warm version of the Black Russian. My daughter usually mixes oz coffee liquor with oz of vodka and tops it up with hot, black coffee. Mind you she adds a dollop of cream to hers, but it's that White Russian thing coming through again.

On my last birthday I was given some pre-mixed Black Russians, absolutely awful. They were what my granddaughter calls Tall Black Russians, trust her brother not to have remembered that I hate coke.

Well time for a nap, then maybe I'll be able to have a Black Russian before dinner.

Learn more about this author, Louanne Cox.
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