Eiskaffee — tasting notes & food pairings

Eiskaffee

Eiskaffee — literally "ice coffee" in German — is the classic German-Austrian café iced coffee: a tall glass of cold, sweetened coffee with one or two scoops of vanilla ice cream floating in it, crowned with a generous swirl of whipped cream and often a dusting of cocoa or grated chocolate. Served with both a long spoon and a straw, it sits between a drink and a dessert: the ice cream slowly melts into the coffee to make it thick, cold and sweet, while the whipped cream on top gives every sip a soft dairy richness. It is a summer fixture of Kaffeehaus and Konditorei menus across the German-speaking world, quite distinct from the American "iced coffee" of chilled coffee over ice.

BittersweetNon-alcoholic

An Eiskaffee reads first as cold sweet coffee poured into soft vanilla cream: aromatic, gently bitter coffee meets vanilla ice cream and airy whipped cream, the scoops melting to turn the drink thick, cold and milky. The sugar and dairy fat tame the coffee's bite while the coffee cuts the sweetness, giving a rich, spoonable-and-sippable dessert-drink that finishes as a thick, sweet coffee-milkshake beneath the last of the foam. The vanilla and the roasted-caramel coffee share a warm register that makes the pairing read as one cohesive flavour, cocoa or chocolate on top adding a bittersweet edge.