From the black-and-gold awnings over the front of every other pub, you’d think no one in Dublin drank anything but Guinness. In fact, a craft beer revolution in Ireland is posing a serious challenge to the black stuff.
Visit one of the many craft bars in the city, and you’ll get the chance to taste beers from microbreweries all over the country. At L Mulligan Grocer in Stoneybatter, for example, I tried two great brews: Trouble Brewing’s Beoir #2 (7.8% abv), an imperial red ale made in collaboration with the craft beer group Beoir, Ireland’s answer to Camra; and Metalman Heat Sink (4.9% abv), from Waterford, a smoked porter with a pinch of cayenne pepper (deliciously smooth and less spicy than it sounds).
Mulligan also pair beers with food. I drank a sultry, dark brown ale called Oxman (€3.15 Martins, €3.19 McHugh’s; 5.8% abv) from the pub’s own Brown Paper Bag Project, a series of collaborations with different microbreweries (this one originally with Derbyshire’s Dancing Duck), which was a brilliant match for a robust, wild boar stew.
Over in Galway, meanwhile, I hit on another rip-snorting ale, the refreshing Kinnegar Rustbucket Rye (5.1% abv on tap at Tigh Neachtain), which was a nicely judged combination of hoppiness and spiciness, and widely available across the Republic and Northern Ireland, at £2.69-£2.99 (€3.29-€3.79).
According to Beoir, in 2010 there were 27 pubs serving craft beer in Ireland; in early 2014, that figure was 559. Such homegrown demand doesn’t leave much for export to the UK, but it’s worth checking out craft beer bars such as the Euston Tap and Bristol’s Small Bar for St Patrick’s Day specials, or even flying to Dublin, which is a mere hop, skip and Ryanair bump over the Irish Sea. (There’s an Irish Beer & Whisky Festival, on in Dublin this weekend, if you happen to be there).
If you’re after a more classic style of stout, I was impressed by the long-established Porterhouse’s own brews, a 4.2% abv Plain Porter (£1.99 a 330ml bottle from beersofeurope.co.uk, €1.80 from drinkstore.ie) that beats Guinness hands down, though, like Guinness, it’s served over-chilled, and an excellent, salty Oyster Stout (4.6% abv) that at time of writing seemed to be available only in Porterhouse’s bars (there’s one in Covent Garden, London). Marks & Spencer, incidentally, has a richer, more espresso-like Irish Stout (4.5% abv), from the Carlow Brewing Company, for £2.29 a 500ml bottle, which would be spot on with boiled bacon or some of that gorgeous dark, malty Guinness bread.
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