NEW YORK (TheStreet) -- Irish whiskey has experienced a remarkable resurgence in the last generation.

Once the most popular whiskey in the U.S., it lost its dominant position to Scotch after the repeal of Prohibition. Ireland was home to between 80 and 100 distilleries in the 19th century but had only two by the 1980s, Bushmills and Middleton. Now there are 10, seven of which have opened in the last decade. In honor of St. Patrick's Day, we tell the story of Irish whiskey through a series of images.

Whiskey derives from the Gaelic uisce beatha, meaning "water of life" and has been made in Ireland since about the 12th century. The drink is essentially distilled beer, which can be made from any grain, though corn and barley are the most common. For centuries, the beer was distilled in pot stills, whose very inefficiency at removing impurities gives the drink its character.

In 1831, Irishman Aeneas Coffey patented the first column still, which distills continuously and thus results in a purer spirit. The continuous still, as its also known, allowed for the mass production of spirits. But whiskey producers still impart flavor to their entry-level products by blending whiskeys, and the greatest whiskeys are made in pot stills.

Irish whiskey was historically an export product and remains so to this day, with the U.S. alone for accounting for about 60% of exports. The taxes once levied on the drink by the British made it too expensive for most Irish to buy and led them to call it "Parliamentary whiskey." Instead, most Irish consumed poitín, or Irish moonshine, says Jack McGarry, a Belfast native and the co-founder of The Dead Rabbit Grocery and Grog in New York, which features about 140 Irish whiskeys. The tradition survives, and O'Begley, in Pittsfield, N.Y, makes a version. McGarry is working on one as well, which he will call Mordain Poitín, he says.

The inflection point for Irish whiskey's popularity in the U.S. came in 1988 when Pernod Richard SA bought the Irish Distillers Group, which owned the Jameson brand. Pernod promoted the beverage brilliantly, and its popularity has revived the entire category. John Rankin, a spirits buyer at Chambers Street Wines in New York, calls Jameson "fresh and zesty. It's citrusy, light and as refreshing as a whiskey can be," he says.

Jameson is produced at the Midleton distillery in County Cork, in the south of Ireland. Its rival Bushmills is made at the eponymous distillery in Country Antrim about an hour's drive from Belfast in Northern Ireland. Duncan McRoberts, a whiskey expert at Le Dû's Wines in New York, prefers Bushmills, which he says is "more refined and not overly sweet or woody." Like most Irish whiskeys, it's an easier-drinking beverage than Scotch. Irish whiskey, McRoberts says, "is a whiskey that you can open and throw the cork in the fire," because you and a group of friends can enjoy a bottle over the course of an evening.

Before the emergence of Jameson, Irish whiskey was perhaps most loved in the U.S. for adding the heat to Irish coffee. McGarry spent months trying to design the perfect Irish whiskey for his bar, which offers two versions. Both feature Sumatra coffee warmed to 78 degrees Celsius, sweetened with Demerara sugar, an unrefined or brown sugar, and topped with cream that has a 36% fat content and thus floats on the coffee. McGarry finishes the coffee with a few gratings of nutmeg. He features Jameson in one of his Irish coffees; aged in charred barrels, it imparts vanilla notes. The other he finishes with Powers Signature Release, which makes a spicier, more intense beverage. "We believe that we sell the best Irish coffee in the world," McGarry says.

McGarry has brought the same obsession to his cocktail menu. He says that Irish whiskey has more diversity than Scottish whiskeys. Both forms have blended, single-grain and single-malt whiskey (or whisky, if you're Scottish), but only the Irish make single pot still whiskey. He exploits that diversity by incorporating dozens of different Irish whiskeys into at least that many cocktails at the Dead Rabbit. One recent critic, Eater's Naren Young, loved the Pyscho Killer, which Dead Rabbit head bartender Jillian Vose created. "I'd describe it as a slightly richer and boozier version of a Negroni," McGarry says. "The chocolate and bitter cocoa nib work wonderfully with the sherried component which is inherit in characteristics."

The rising popularity of Irish whiskey means that a number of new products have come onto the market in recent years. As an example of an excellent blended whiskey, McGarry cites the Jameson Select Reserve Black Barrel. About 60% of the blend is made in pot stills, and it's aged in sherry casks and old bourbon barrels, which are charred in Kentucky to impart notes of vanilla and spice.

Single-malt whiskey remains the most prestigious - and expensive - type of Scotch, and some Irish producers are seeking that level of exclusivity for their whiskeys. Rankin points to the Knappogue 12 Year as a "touchstone for the traditional, lighter style." It's made in pot stills and aged in used bourbon barrels.

McGarry and McRoberts both speak highly of the Powers John's Lane, which is named for a Dublin distillery but made in Midleton. It's a single pot-still whiskey made from both unmalted and malted barley and aged in bourbon barrels that are being used for the second or even third time, McGarry says, which means they don't impart much flavor and instead allow the mash bill, as whiskey experts call the grain from which the whiskey is made, and the distillate to impart flavor. McGarry describes notes of banana and coffee; McRoberts picks up melon and chamomile.

Bourbon barrels are common aging vessels for both Scotch and Irish whiskey because the U.S. regulations governing bourbon allow barrels to be used only once. To recoup some of their considerable investment in the barrels, bourbon producers generally sell them thereafter. The increased popularity of bourbon in the U.S. has resulted in the greater availability of used barrels and helped condition the market for higher-end Irish whiskey. Some producers are courting U.S. bourbon drinkers with whiskies that have notes of vanilla, spice and sweeter oak, Rankin says. The Green and Yellow Spot whiskies, made at the Midleton distillery, are ambitious examples.