I have the utmost confidence in Charles Babinski and Kyle Glanville, the co-founders of G&B Coffee and Go Get Em Tiger and two of America’s leading coffee professionals. However, on my most recent visit to G&B, their progressive coffee bar in downtown L.A.’s Grand Central Market, a blackboard menu listing had me puzzled. Espresso Dark & Stormy?

I understand the duo has more or less mastered espresso, and I’m familiar with the Dark ‘n’ Stormy, a rum and ginger beer cocktail that originated in Bermuda about 100 years back. At G&B, the owners feature a Dark & Stormy ($5) with espresso instead of rum, plus house-made ginger beer, perhaps a nod to their coffee pop-up at Sydney’s Paramount Coffee Project, in a country that’s mad for ginger beer. Coffee is far from rum’s equal, but Glanville and Babinski did find an espresso – Heart Coffee Roasters’ Chelelektu – that has enough bright acidity, with notes of “peach, lemonade, oolong,” to complement the effervescent, slightly spicy ginger beer. An Ethiopian espresso with dark chocolate characteristics, for instance, no doubt wouldn’t do the trick. Bonus: G&B serves their Espresso Dark & Stormy as a split shot, simultaneously topping a glass of ginger beer, and as a caffeinated sidecar.