An Irish Brewmance

 

In 1755 Arthur Guinness used a £100 bequest to start a small brewery near Dublin with his brother. He started brewing a porter which begat a stout. Long story short port is heavier than ale but lighter than a stout.

 

Things went well and in 1759, Arthur signed an unbelievable lease for an unused brewery in Dublin located at St. James Gate where it is still operating today. The lease was  £45 a year with a term of 9,000 years. Not a typo. In 1769 he exported ale for the first time sending 6 ½ barrels to England. Guinness keeps it sales volumes very tight so that last numbers I could find were for 2011 then selling an estimated 850,000,000 litres of beer around the world.

 

The soft creamy topping didn’t always adorn the mug but was introduced in 1959 by adding nitrogen instead of CO2 as most beers use. Nitrogen produces smaller bubbles than CO2 creating a smoother drink. In 1988 they introduced the widget, a small round food grade plastic ball into their cans. The beer in the cans are pressurized, some of which is trapped in the widget.  When the can is opened and depressurizes, the widget rattles around the can releasing the trapped beer creating foam. Poured properly it delivers that creamy topping and mouth feel. 

 To avoid problems of shipping their foamy elixir around the world, Guinness has opened breweries in over 50 countries including Canada. I cannot remember when I drank my first Canadian can of Guinness but I must admit to being somewhat sceptical at the time regarding the quality of any beer that comes in a can. Boy was I wrong. My only previous experience was sipping it from a glass freshly poured from a cask while touring around Loch Ness Scotland back in 1996. It was here that my love for the black liquid was kindled.

Our return to Dublin for a day was to accommodate a visit to the mother brewery for a “GUINNESS EXPERIENCE”.  Should have been suspicious with the over use of large caps. While the EXPERIENCE was created in one of the oldest brew buildings on site, there was little left to indicate that the place ever made beer.

The term “glitz” would be an understatement. The EXPERIENCE had lots of neon, flashing lights, big screen TV’s, catchy music and large steam punk decorated areas where you could indulge your appetite for  food and a pint and spend more money, basically a five story pub and souvenir shop. I was looking for a tour of a working brewery not a Disney experience. Though, I have to admit having the image of my face set in the foam was kind of cool.  

I do loudly profess that I am not a fan of “Big Beer” and Guinness is certainly up there with the biggest. I prefer to spend my beer budget on locally made dark craft beer but I can't seem to stop comparing  their offerings to Guinness, may Goibhniu (Irish God of beer) forgive me. They are not there yet but getting close but until then  I will purchase the odd 4 pack of Guinness, just to keep my palette educated.

 

Overwhelmed by the EXPERIENCE and perhaps the Guinness, we headed back to the hotel for a nap. We are off to Cork tomorrow.