Smith & Kearns

Coffee liqueur and cream with club soda — the White Russian made lighter and more sessionable, the carbonation cutting through the richness to refresh the palate.

Smith & Kearns is a lightly effervescent after-dinner cocktail that distinguishes itself from the denser, still cream-and-coffee drinks of the same era by incorporating club soda — a simple addition that transforms the texture of the coffee liqueur and cream combination from rich and heavy into something lighter and more refreshing. Kahlúa, the Mexican coffee liqueur created in 1936 at the Veracruz-based Blanco y Negro company using a blend of Arabica coffee, rum, vanilla, and sugar, became one of the most widely distributed liqueurs in the American market by the 1970s, featuring in the Black Russian, the White Russian, and dozens of other preparations. The addition of club soda to the standard cream-and-coffee-liqueur structure was an innovation that addressed a specific practical problem: straight cream cocktails are excellent for the first few sips but can become heavy over the course of a longer drink. The soda's carbonation provides an effervescence that regularly refreshes the palate, making the drink more sessionable than the still version while preserving the fundamental coffee-cream flavor profile. The drink's name — Smith & Kearns — has no firmly established documented origin, following the pattern of many mid-century American bar cocktails that circulated through supper club and steakhouse menus without formal documentation of their creator.