A Baby Guinness Shot Doesn't Actually Contain Any Of The Beer Itself

The reason a Guinness beer is so dark in color and the reason a baby Guinness shot is just as inky aren't the same reason at all — they're totally different drinks altogether. The only thing these two drinks have in common (besides an aspect of their name) is their appearance. Guinness is dark because of the intense heat used to roast the barley grains, but a baby Guinness is only a Guinness in name. With no beer to speak of, it contains two different cordials: coffee liqueur and Irish cream. These two ingredients, expertly layered so that the cream floats on top of the liqueur to resemble the head of a classic Guinness, are taken as a sweet shot or enjoyed as an after-dinner sipper.

The layering effect that gives a baby Guinness its name can be credited to a density difference between the recipe's two types of alcohol. While a popular Irish cream like Baileys has a specific gravity of 1.05, coffee-flavored liqueurs like Kahlúa weigh in at 1.16. When poured at the right angle, this can cause the Irish cream to hang suspended over the coffee liqueur, producing that foamy "head" effect that looks suspiciously like the head of a properly poured pint of Guinness.

The difference in density between coffee liqueur and Irish cream comes down to their respective sugar content. Irish cream, which was created with an American audience in mind, packs 18 grams of sugar into a 3-ounce pour. Popular coffee liqueur Kahlúa, on the other hand, contains nearly 40 grams in every 100 milliliters (about 3.3 ounces). To keep the cream from breaking the surface of the base layer and blending into a swirl of black and tan, a skilled bartender will often use the back of a bar spoon to soften the impact of the incoming booze, allowing it to sit on top. To do this, hover the spoon at an angle just over the surface of the coffee liqueur and slowly pour the cream so that it trickles over the upside-down spoon and into the glass.

If this sounds above your skill level, you can also make a foam from the Irish cream using a handheld frother and scooping the bubbles on top of the darker booze with a spoon. Whichever method you choose, make sure you use a shot glass with a mouth wide enough for a bar spoon to fit inside. When all is said and done, you'll want to use 1 ounce of coffee liqueur and ½ ounce of Irish cream to create the effect of a perfectly poured pint.