A trip to Dublin, and a water tasting menu...

In Dublin's fair city, where the girls are so pretty, you can get everything you can get in London, but at a higher price.

No journey through The Emerald City would be complete without a trip to The Old Jameson Distillery on Bow Street, or indeed a tour of The Guinness Storehouse at St James's Gate. The Botanical Gardens are nice in a botanical garden kind of way, and Trinity College is great if you've never seen Oxford or Cambridge.

In the everlasting search for something more, something different, something new, we found 3fe. "Found" in the "we did an internet search and they showed up" sense. If we didn't share with you their unrivalled ingenuity, then, dear Chroniclers, it would be gross negligence on our part.

Colin Harmon used to be an investment banker in Dublin's financial district - remember that bit because it makes it more brilliant later - but he is now the proud owner of 3fe. 3fe is an independent coffee shop in Dublin. It's just like the rest of us - coffee, cake, snobbery, etc - or at least it was until Colin launched his new tasting menu.

Guatemalan arabica beans? Tanzanian robusta beans? Cold Brew? Pour-over? No, no, no and no. Colin introduced a water tasting menu. Yes, we said water. For €3.50, Colin's customers could compare four shots of water - bottled, soft, boiled, and 3fe's own water (eau de tap?). The purpose was to highlight the impact that water has on brewed coffee. The result was a hail of social media bullets.

Colin was quick to defend his Celtic Tiger impression and declare that all proceeds would be donated to water charities in Africa. For the trolls, this was too little too late and they caused crafty Colin to endure what he calls his "least pleasant year" at 3fe. He's written a blog post all about the financially inspiring incident in which he addresses the €3.50 price mark by saying, "I just put the first number down that popped into my head but with hindsight I now greatly regret that decision". Nice one, Colin, you've just completely lifted the lid on the secret of coffee shop pricing.