London café serving whisky for a penny

Covent Garden coffee house The Black Penny is selling shots of single malt Scotch for a penny this month in a bid to help people banish the winter blues.

The venue on Great Queen Street will be offering coffee hounds the chance to pimp their cappuccinos with a shot of Beinn Dubh single malt whisky for just 1p.

The offer comes through a collaboration with the Highlands-based Speyside Distillery, which producers a number of single malts including Beinn Dubh, which means “the black mountain” in Gaelic.

Beinn Dubh

Beinn Dubh is the name given to Ben Macdui, the highest peak in the Cairngorm mountain range, by Professor Norman Collie, who reached the summit in 1891.

The £50 whisky gets its treacle-black colour from resting in toasted Port casks from the Douro Valley and offers notes of sultanas, chocolate and spice.

Penny shots are available weekdays from 10am until noon throughout January, including Burns Night on Monday 25^th, when Scotland’s most famous poet, Robert Burns, is honoured with recitals, whisky and lashings of haggis.

You have to be over 18 to be able to indulge in a shot, with one whisky coffee per person per day allowed.

The Black Penny is inspired by the coffee houses of 17^th century England, known as Penny Universities, where patrons were given access to the news of the day.

A penny would gain you entry into the coffee house, where you could meet to discuss everything from current affairs, politics and poetry to gossip.

Coffee houses were open to all social classes though women were largely excluded. Influential patrons included Samuel Pepys, Alexander Pope and Isaac Newton.

This isn’t the first time The Black Penny has offered its customers booze for a penny – in August it started serving Prosecco for a penny at weekends to celebrate its new brunch offering.