Put your feet up, weary travellers and Monday mourners. It's National Irish Coffee Day.

The history of the Irish coffee is as interesting as the drink is delicious. In 1942, a group of exhausted travellers arrived at Foynes Airbase after an 18-hour journey across the Atlantic. The head chef at the restaurant at the airbase made the group some coffees with a splash of whisky to take the edge off, and legend has it, one of the travellers asked if the delicious concoction was Brazilian coffee, explains Punch Bowl. The chef, Joe Sheridan, quipped back quickly that it's not Brazilian coffee, it's Irish coffee!

Ten years later, the drink had made its way to America, specifically to the Buena Vista Inn in San Francisco. There, owner Jack Koeppler partnered with Stanton Delaplane, a travel writer, to recreated the Irish Coffee that had been making waves at Shannon Airport in Ireland, says The Buena Vista. After some experimentation, the pair was encountering problems. The taste was off, and the cream wasn't floating on top of the drink like it did in Ireland. Koeppler got on a plane to go taste an Irish Coffee for himself and when he returned, he figured out the tricks to get it tasting quite right.

Here's how to make a perfect Irish Coffee, just like the one made back in the '40s, recipe from The Buena Vista. If the cream won't float, this is likely because American cream is super-pasteurized, says The Kitchn. If you whip the cream lightly until very soft peaks form, you can pour it over a warm spoon and it should float. Even better, go to a local dairy and buy some unpasteurized milk.