100 Years of Irish Brewing in 50 Objects: #6 - A Drayman's Delivery Docket from Sullivan's Brewery (1892)

I could speak of the beer drinking capabilities of some of the Walshe mountain girls - but why should we cavil at the amount of refreshment which is taken after a walk of twelve miles from the hills, another return walk of similar length in perspective, and in addition holding on in the dance "to tire each other down" for some three or four hours? Could we say half a gallon of that washy stuff known in Ireland as "pale butt," was too much for a girl? You may think so, reader, but I do not. The question is, after all, one of stowage.

A Strangers Impressions of County Kilkenny – The Kilkenny Moderator - Saturday 19th July 1851

Those comments were made by a tourist who was staying in Bishop’s Hotel in Thomastown, Kilkenny and were in regard to a fair day in the town, and the people who came in from the countryside for dancing and socialising. Regardless of the comments on the ability of ‘the Walshe mountain girls’ to consume ‘refreshment,’ his description of a drink called ‘Pale Butt’ and it being ‘washy stuff’ is of interest to those curious about Irish brewing history. We must keep in mind that elsewhere in his report to the newspaper he twice mentions drinking Cherry’s Double Stout, so his opinion of other beers might be in relative terms but ‘washy’ can hardly be regarded as a praisesome term for any drink.

-o-

Our related brewing object is a delivery docket for a half barrel of Pale Butt from 1892, brewed by Sullivan’s Brewery which operated from James’s Street in Kilkenny on the site of an earlier brewery being operated by a Mr. Archdeakin in at least 1702. As ever with Irish brewing history the facts are a little muddy but the brewery on James's Street appears to have passed through different hands - for example a John Hennessy was a brewer on this street in 1788 - before the site became vacant in 1790. It was purchased and reopened by William Sullivan and William Loughnane in 1810. Mr. Loughnane appears to have left the business as it was operating as 'Messrs. Sullivans Brewery' in a newspaper article in March 1815 when a fire broke out in the malt house there. (Indeed, a portion of the brewery was destroyed by another fire in October 1880 while the funeral was taking place of the then owner James Sullivan's brother Francis - grandsons of William and sons of Richard Sullivan M.P.) The company - which employed 150 people at one point - actually consisted of two breweries and a bottling store for mineral water and soft drinks when a new brewery was completed not far from the original site in June 1877. This new site was possibly a repurposing of an existing brewery as there was a Hibernian Anchor Brewery on the street in 1859, and that fire in 1880 destroyed part of the old brewery, not this new premises. It appears to have stayed in the Sullivan family until it finally closed in 1919, the brewery being taken over by Smithwick’s and closed with the employees receiving 'a fortnight's notice that their services will be dispensed with.' according to one newspaper. Parts of the premises were subsequently used as a maltings by the Smithwick brewery and the site is now a carpark for Market Cross Shopping Centre. Advertisements from 1895 show that Sullivan’s were brewing a pale butt, a double stout, sparkling ales and hop bitters as well as manufacturing and bottling Mineral waters at this time.*

The half barrel of pale butt was delivered to a Laurence Long who had at this time a public house and grocery store on the corner of Barrack Street and the Castlecomer road, which is now known as Lenehan’s Public House. According to newspapers of the time he appears to have sold the business to Rose Lenehan in 1913 and took over a premises instead on John Street (now called The World’s End Bar) which he ran very briefly until his untimely death that same year.

The drayman who delivered the cask on his route was a J.(?) Dowling and the cask number was 2574. This number ensured that the casks could be tracked and returned to the brewery. It was also helpful if a full barrel of beer was stolen, and a newspaper report in The Kilkenny Moderator on the 26th of October 1892 records that a barrel of pale butt was stolen from a Mr. Grace on Parliament Street in Kilkenny and was tracked to a house on Horse Barrack Lane (which curves from Parliament Street along the front of the Smithwick’s brewhouse that is now the new Abbey Quarter Development Building) where the number confirmed it to be the missing cask. The two thieves who had attempted to sell the barrel to some public houses without success were sentenced to a fortnight hard labour in Mountjoy prison in Dublin.

-o-

The words ‘pale butt’ relating to a type of beer seems to be one of those relic terms which lost favour over time. It is certainly mentioned by William Ellis in the 1737 edition of The London and Country Brewer as ‘pale Butt-beer’ from Somerset, and over here in The Parliamentary Register: Or, History of the Proceedings and Debates of the House of Commons of Ireland in 1793 in an enquiry into brewing and distilling here ‘pale butt’ is mentioned twice as a common commodity before that date.

As we move forward in time ‘pale butt’ appears to be a term that remained much more common in Ireland than in England, Scotland, or Wales if the unscientific method of looking at mentions in the newspapers of the mid-19th to the very early parts of the 20th century is to be used as a measurement. (It was certainly still used elsewhere but it wasn’t quite as common and isn’t the focus of the topic here.) Breweries such as Lett’s. Watson’s, Cherry’s, Keily’s, Smithwick’s, Sullivan’s, Castlebellingham, Dower’s and others were all using the words to describe a beer style at one point or another. And although the term seems to have begun in England, its relative decline outside of Ireland is yet another reminder that although we share a lot with the island to our East, we are remarkably different in many ways, not least how language changed and evolved here or - in cases like this perhaps - stalled. With regard to brewing, this may be because of the large number of English brewers who came over to Ireland to set up and work in the breweries here, and the terminology they brought and left behind in the late 18th and early 19th century stayed here long after newer words and meanings had replaced them across the water, just as some ‘normal’ daily words in common use have remained here too.

From a practical point of view a beer butt is a wooden barrel that is twice the volume of a hogshead at 108 Imperial gallons and in the above-mentioned publication that Mr. Ellis asserts that it was the best size for fermenting and condition beers due to aspects of its physical size and volume and that ‘butt-beer is at this time in greater reputation than ever in London ...’ As we can see from the docket (and the mentions below) the beer certainly wasn't always supplied in a butt-sized barrel.

-o-

To find out where pale butt fitted into an Irish brewery's range of beers we need to return yet again to the advertisements in newspapers of the time in question, which is a somewhat inaccurate method of research in many ways but it is unfortunately one of the few resources we have, given the dearth of old brewing records available to the public. Taken singly they might be unhelpful but by looking at the many mentions and references we have we can begin to build a better picture of what type of beer this was and where it fits into our brewing history.

There are early mentions of Irish brewers brewing the style, for example a David Sherlock on Glover's Alley, a table beer brewer, had 'commenced the brewing of Porter, Ale, Pale Butt and 30s[hilling] Beer' according to The Dublin Evening Post from the 5th of January 1797 and in Saunder's News-Letter on the 9th of November 1799 Thomas Fullam advertised himself as a 'Pale Butt, Ale and Table Beer Brewer' on Constitution Hill in Dublin. (Pale Butt was his dearest beer of the three, which is worth keeping in mind for later.)  In The Hibernian Journal on the 21st of September 1805 William Robinson of 110 The Coombe in Dublin was advertising his ‘Pale Butt, Porter, & Small Beer Brewery’ while in Saunders's News-Letter on the 4th of July 1808 Andrew Maziere of James’s Street also in Dublin was advertising ‘Porter, Pale Butt, and Table Beer.’ An advertisement in Saunders's News-Letter on the 5th of April 1813 for beers from the Castlebellingham brewery mentions ‘strong ale and pale butt’ (in later advertisements table beer is also listed) and in The Tipperary Free Press on the 3rd of January 1829 Greer & Murphy of The Clonmel Brewery were listing double strong ale, pale butt, ale, porter and table beer all as separate products. Where prices are mentioned, pale butt is generally on the cheaper side of things with the odd exception, such as the early mention by Thomas Fullam above.

By 1835 Thomas Cherry of King Street Brewery in Waterford and Creywell brewery in New Ross was advertising what looks like a hierarchy of brewings as ‘XX and X ale, and Pale Butt’ (with ‘Beer’ tagged on to the end of the line up in later advertisements) in The Wexford Conservative of the 23rd of December 1835, and a list of beers for sale in The Drogheda Conservative Journal on the 31st of March 1838 lists pale butt, plain ale, X ale and XX ale in ascending order of price, with all but the pale butt listed as from Cairnes’ brewery in Drogheda, although they were brewing such a product in the previous decade so it may have been theirs too.

Up in Belfast Charles Murison was brewing nine beers in 1842 – XXX, XX and X ales, XX and X Brown Stout, Superior Porter and Pale Butt, Family Pale Beer, and Common Beer, which were listed in that order according to an advertisement in The Belfast Mercantile Register & Weekly Advertiser on the 22nd of February 1842. Most revealing is the following passage:

To those who prefer a stronger article for table use than beer, the Pale Butt will be found a very pleasant beverage, as a medium between Ale and Beer.

This is quite telling as it seems to confirm what we see in other advertisements, that pale butt appears to be a lighter and cheaper type of beer, or had certainly morphed into that by the early-to-mid-19th century. It is worth noting that I have used the word beer in the modern all-encompassing sense often here, but from what I have seen from this and other advertisements in the past we used the term ‘beer’ here in Ireland for the weakest and lightest form of brewed beverage – and this is probably a hangover from the popularity of table beer as a general beverage in the late 18th and early 19th century. It would appear that the name clung on here for a weaker brew, so at this time – and later – ‘ale’ didn’t mean an unhopped product and ‘beer’ a hopped one as it may have done elsewhere (or earlier) the terms were used to signify strength with our pale butt in the middle at this time.

So, just to reiterate, at this time it appears that of the paler brewings in Ireland we had in ascending order of strength and cost - ‘beer,’ then ‘butt,’ then ‘ale.’ (We also had ‘brown beers’ brewed by St. Stephen’s Brewery in Waterford and others, which were probably a lighter version of their ‘basic’ porter.)

If we want more reinforcement of this theory we can look at Sullivan’s rival in Kilkenny, the St. Francis Abbey Brewery of Edmond Smithwick who in 1852, just a couple of decades after commencing to brew on an old distillery site, was producing ‘Double, and Single, Stout Porters; Extra Strong, and Strong Ales, Pale Butt, and Table Beer’ in and advertisement in The Kilkenny Moderator on the 21st of January of that year. Helpfully too, St. Stephen’s Brewery listed their prices in The Waterford Chronicle in December 1874 which starts with a XXXX sweet ale at 21 shillings and drops through India Pale Ale, XXX Mild and Family Ale to Pale Butt at 8 shillings for a firkin of 9 Gallons.

As late as 1900 the brewers of Louth were publishing a list of price increases for their beers in The Freeman’s Journal that once again lists a range based on prices starting with the most expensive with strong mild ales then East India and Amber Ales, followed by Pale Butt and then Dinner and an enigmatic East India Beer and lastly plain ‘Beer,’ and if price equates to the quantities of ingredients used then we can take pricing as being a relatively safe way of judging the strength of the beer.  There are a few exceptions where a Pale Butt mention is prefaced with ‘Strong’ but generally speaking 'Pale Butt' appears to be a weaker brew than ale … ‘washy’ as described by the writer quoted above.

As to its exact taste, St. Stephen’s Brewery were involved in a dispute with a publican regarding the quality of their beer as recorded in The Clonmel Chronicle on the 8th of April 1874, where ‘two kilderkins [of East India pale ale] turned out inferior, and he had to sell all as pale butt.’ This gives an inkling of how it tasted as it was clearly not as strong in relative terms as their IPA. An article in The Freeman’s Journal from the 15th of March 1913 quotes an English writer from 1798 who wrote about ‘a sweetish malt liquor, called ‘pale butt,’ unlike anything I have ever drunk elsewhere,’ which again helps a little with how it tasted and reinforces that the name was not very common in England even at that time. Yet another mention in a court case recorded in The Kilkenny Moderator on the 27th of December 1865 states that ‘it would take a long time to get drunk on ‘pale butt,’' and another in The New Ross Standard on the 20th of September 1907 which mentions that Cherry’s pale butt was ‘not very strong.’

So, pale butt could possibly be best described as a low-hopped, slightly malt-forward beer, pale in colour, low in alcohol and cheap to buy – but still a little stronger and not as cheap as the ‘beer’ available at this time. All of which is of course pure conjecture, but it seems to be the correct assumption.

That term for a style of beer brewed in Ireland seems to have disappeared from the island in the first decade of the 20th century, but did the actual product itself disappear too? Perhaps, but it may have lingered briefly, renamed as a mild or X ale in some breweries, but with the huge popularity of porter and stout here it may have just disappeared, being unwanted and unneeded, and ultimately unfamiliar to a 20th century drinker. It might be argued that it returned in spirit at least in the new beers that appeared in the middle of that century like Phoenix and Smithwick’s Draught – low-ish alcohol beers that were made for drinking in relatively large quantities on social occasions.

-o-

On that note let us return to Sullivan’s Pale Butt and specifically to an account of a Harvest Home feast (a relatively common occurrence in the Big Houses in the past) from The Farmer’s Gazette on the 18th of October 1850 which seems quite fitting to end with …

HARVEST HOME AT FARMLEY CASTLE, KILKENNY

The annual substantial feast came off at this ancient and time-honoured establishment, on Saturday last, when all the workpeople, with their wives and families, were most sumptuously entertained. The rooms were most tastefully decorated with flowering shrubs and evergreens - “Nature's own darling hue;” and when the apartments were brilliantly lighted up, all had a most imposing and thrilling effect - thanks to the superior taste of Brette, the carpenter.
The dinner being over, the musicians poured forth their most soft and enchanting strains, which made the old and feeble forget their infirmities, and the youthful their previous toil, and all joined in the merry dance, which was kept up in the true Irish fashion, until very late hour.

“How gaily, even amidst gloom surrounding,

They still canst wake at pleasure's thrill,

Like Memnon’s broken image sounding,

Amidst desolation, tuneful still.'' 

Even the noble-hearted proprietor and his lady did not disdain to take the hands of their simple-hearted and grateful rustics, and share with them the pleasure of dancing the merry “foxhunter’s jig.” To the eye of the philanthropist, surveying at this moment the happy faces of the entire company, he could not but bless the source whose bounty contributed so largely to make so many of the children of toil and labour delighted and comfortable. Sullivan's pale butt, and Jamieson’s stingo, were done ample justice to, with abundance of tea and coffee for the teetotallers. Great merit is due to Mr. Mclntyre, the intelligent and respectable steward of the establishment, for the orderly manner in which everything was arranged.

As florid and loquacious as this report is it certainly paints a picture of enjoying a nice beer or two to celebrate an occasion, where all are welcome and there is something for everyone – even those wanting a ‘washy’ pale butt ...

Liam K

P.S. I have at times used the word beer in its modern general sense here as well as highlighting where in the past that same word meant the lightest of brewed beverages, and I hope the context of their use differentiates one from the other.

* Adapted from a piece on Kilkenny breweries I wrote about here, which lists any references.

(Here is the link to object #7)

Please note, all written content and the research involved in publishing it here is my own unless otherwise stated and cannot be reproduced elsewhere without permission, full credit to its sources, and a link back to this post. The docket and the attached image are the authors own and cannot be used elsewhere without the author's permission. Newspaper research and images are thanks to The British Newspaper Archive.

Opinion: Guinness and Me – Love and Hate at the Heart of Darkness …

My first encounter with Guinness was as a small child in the very early seventies when my father would on occasion bring home four or so half-pint bottles after work from the local grocery shop that doubled as a public house - as many still did in rural Ireland in the last century and well before that too. I was only three or four years old but I can still clearly remember sitting on the floor at his feet playing while he sat on an armchair beside our Stanley cooker. He'd pour one into into a glass before placing the empty bottle beside the chair leg with a clink of glass on tile. I’m sure this ritual happened on a Friday because my mother would be baking as she normally did on that evening and the smell of soda bread filled the kitchen along with the heat from the stove. Under his watchful eye (and out of my mother’s) I would pick up the small, stumpy bottle and put it to my lips, before tipping it back and letting the tiny dregs of stout coat my tongue and cause my mouth to pucker. I guess I just wanted to be part of his Friday night tradition of enjoying those hard-earned bottles at the end of a long arduous week. He wasn’t much of a drinker in truth so it’s curious that this is one of my earliest remembered interactions with him, and although small parts of it might be misremembered and embellished by the progress of time and a need for joyful memories, the basic elements are true.

For my next serious encounter we need to fast-forward a few years to the late eighties. While listening to a gig in a local bar in town a friend persuaded me to order a draught Guinness as a change from the usual pint of Harp, as that was what he drank. I certainly didn’t take to it at the first sip, as taste-wise it was radically different from my lager, but something must certainly have appealed to me as I continued to drink it for almost two decades. It might have been the influence of my drinking partner, who also introduced me to smoking - although that was a habit I thankfully didn’t take up - or maybe I liked how it looked, or perhaps I felt I was cool to be drinking it - as if I had finally grown up? I’m really not sure. Certainly – at first anyway – the actual taste didn’t play a part and I doubt any nostalgic longing to my childhood did either.

But I grew to love my pints of Guinness.

I drank it all over Ireland, in parts of England, and a lot of Europe too. I savoured pints from Dublin to Kerry, and Mayo to Cork. I drank it gladly in pubs in Islington and Hounslow, Birmingham and Manchester. I even consumed it on cold nights in Irish bars in Innsbruck and Bruges, and on summer holidays in Greece and Italy and many other too-hot countries. To me it always tasted much the same, apart from some (perceived) exceptional pints served to me on a particularly memorial night and early morning in The Strand guesthouse on Achill, and a dreadful one I had when hungover in the middle of a ridiculously hot day in Protaras, Cyprus.

I would not say I drank it exclusively, and I was never a huge drinker, but it was certainly my number one beer by quantity.

But around 20 years ago I fell out of love with Guinness and I can’t remember exactly when or why, it was certainly a case of ‘it’s-not-you-it’s-me,’ as apart from the dreaded and still linger legacy of Guinness Extra Cold I don’t believe the beer in my glass changed much? I moved back to lagers - usually foreign - often in bottles and rarely to same brand twice, as I was interested in trying new drinks as part of a journey into expanding my food and beverage palate. In my defence back then it was mostly strange lagers which were available apart from one local microbrewery which I certainly flirted with off and on. This change might also have coincided with a camping trip we made around Europe where four of us would bring a case of lager back to our campsite to share, and every night it was a different localish brand, so variety and variation of a sort became the norm.

But then came a trip to Belgium with a group of friends in 2008 and obviously after that I became an insufferable beer snob for a short while as I trod a path well worn by many before me. I wasn’t trying to be that sort of person but somehow the waves of Belgian beer and its culture – however tourist-focussed relatively new it was – washed over me and I was born again, baptised in sour ales, blondes and tripels. I became ‘That Guy’ in the bar who was always trying to persuade others to drink ‘craft’ beers from the newly emerging scene here, or dusty bottles of German bocks, Trappist ales or whatever wasn’t mainstream. I did succeed in converting many of my friends and family along my apostolic-like journey, but I cringe somewhat now as I look back on that early time of shunning certain beers and wonderful bars based solely on their line-up. I spent so much time making meaningless scribbles in notebooks and on apps and finally on a blog, notes that rarely mattered as I would never drink that beer again. I continued to look for the next beer, the new beer, the rare beer.

I won’t say it was a waste of time as such, as I did enjoy every minute of it to be fair, but a small part of me regrets spending so much time on analysing beers and less time experiencing and enjoying them more with the company I was with in some fantastic places.

But soon enough I began to mellow and instead of instigating a talk about beer in a pub I’d let others ask me about what I was drinking (and ask why I spent so long taking pictures of it – more wasteful time!) and used that as a way of getting people to initially talk about beer and then often to trying one, because I really do like to talk about beer and brewing, often to the point of not recognising the abject boredom in my friends faces. More recently I developed a taste for cask ales, which I had only previously tried and somewhat dismissed in England decades ago, and I also began to appreciate lighter styles like mild ales, lager and porters, although mostly from local or small breweries. I also started frequenting 'normal' pubs more often instead of forcing others to my craft-centric places, and there I revisited Guinness Draught again for the first time in decades …

I was underwhelmed. It was fine, there was certainly nothing wrong with what I was poured. It tasted just like it was supposed to, quite mild and slightly bitter, but it lacked … something? Depth and character perhaps? Possibly because I’ve had my palate assailed by the uber-sour, the ultra-hoppy and the over-sticky beers for too many years so I didn’t appreciate the nuanced flavours of this iconic brand – and maybe my age played a part – but how come I could pick these up in cask ales or even understated lagers?

I was certainly disappointed, as part of me wanted it to be a beer I could like because it would make my drinking life and choices in non-craft pubs much easier and maybe more enjoyable. Sadly, that was not the case – there would be no returning of long-lost love into my life. I even tried it again elsewhere but there was no connection, no grá. Nothing.

The romance was truly over.

-O-

Now let me be clear, there is absolutely nothing wrong with draught Guinness. Taste-wise it isn’t dreadful or crap or any of the other words that some have called it. It’s certainly – and ironically – plain for a stout, but no doubt that is its appeal to many. Like Coors, Rockshore, Smithwicks and a host of other macrobrewed beers it is the simplest of its genera and that makes perfect sense, as most people aren’t like those of us who feel the need to talk almost constantly about what we are drinking. Macrobrewed beers are the lubricant to the cogs of conversation and socially enjoyment for the vast majority of beer drinkers, and drops of anything thicker would jam the mechanism or at least slow it down - and I’ve come to appreciate and understand that at least.

I have no objection to nitro-served beers either, in fact I’m quite partial to them at times. But it must be noted that nitrogen does dull – or soften let’s say - the flavours of beers and it certainly changes their taste profile, taking the edge off of it. Therefore if you want (and you may not of course) a nitrogenated beer with any kind of pronounced flavour then – for me, and only me – it needs to start from something with a stronger and fuller flavour profile than Guinness, so for my palate that means stouts which are a little less dry, such as Murphy’s and Beamish on the macro front. For me, both of these are better as nitro-served products, with Guinness and Island’s Edge both on the drier side and relatively similar.

Of course, microbrewed nitro stouts are generally speaking a cut above any of those for my palate, as again – to be clear – personally I am looking for more flavour in my beer these days.

(And yes, I have done a blind tasting.)

But I still drink Guinness by the way, although only in bottles when I’m ‘stuck’ in places where there is no option for something with more flavour and usually only if bottles of Macardles ale are not available – as it at least has some sort of pronounced flavour. This version of Guinness – ‘Original’ or XX, or Extra Stout – is  quite different to Guinness Draught, being just ‘normally’ carbonated apart from anything else. When served at shelf temperature it is a much more appealing and beguiling product than its draught cousin – although it is still far behind most microbrewed bottled stouts. (Again, I have blind tasted a selection of bottled stouts.)

And I certainly don’t love it ... but I do like it.

-O-

These days I don’t generally push microbrewed beers over macrobrewed, as I no longer feel it is my vocation to preach to others regarding what they drink, but I will more often than not favour microbrewed (‘craft’) beers over macrobrewed ones purely on taste. This coupled by the fact that I’m drinking more homebrewed beers these days due to experimenting with Irish historic beer recipes and the need to brew and sample the same. I’m more of a drink-and-let-drink sort of person now, apart from some gentle and expected ribbing of friends and family when it comes to their choice of beers.

But there are beer related matters that irk me and cause me consternation.

The first – as many of you know - is how many Irish restaurants and chefs or butchers and bakers will shout loudly about ‘Artisan’ and ‘Local’ with all the produce the cook and bake with - apart from beers of course, where most will happily include Guinness in their steak pies or brown bread, and baste their locally sourced fancy beef joint in Smithwicks. Some will get into bed with any drink multinational who waves a cheque at them, or they will promote their love of pints of certain mass-produced beers on social media, while in their next post telling their followers not to go to chain cafes, international fast-food restaurants or to eat anything that hasn’t been sourced 10km from where we live by a small farmer or grower. The worse thing is that neither they or their followers can see or appreciate the irony and hypocrisy because, ‘It’s just beer, isn’t it?’ It doesn’t seem to count because beer, perhaps, has always had a stigma attached to it that spirits and wine do not. This is why most restaurants will carefully curate a wines list and have a literal showcase of proper Irish spirits but have three taps of ‘big’ beer on, or worse still a rebadged microbrewed beer under the house name. Which perhaps shows the lack of pride and confidence that some breweries have in their beers, plus the lack of integrity that the restaurant has for its customer – a complete absence of respect for the product and drinker. Would they lie about their meat and other produce too? It makes me wonder about the producers' names on their menus, are they fake too? (It surprises me that practically all craft beer drinkers think this is an okay practice – as long as it isn’t a 'big' brewery doing it …) I am generalising here of course and it is a road I have gone down before but it is worth reiterating here for context.

The other group that infuriates me are the beer drinkers who preach about drinking from small producers and supporting craft, but make an exception for pints of draught Guinness – and only Guinness I might add.

Let me be clear – yet again – this isn’t every beer drinker out there or even craft beer drinker, as there are many beer omnivores who just drink (and write) about beer in general and don’t pontificate – but some do indeed lecture us about big beer versus small and those are the drinkers whose Guinness exception I cannot understand. I am indeed one of the much maligned ‘drink what you like’ brigade who at this stage in their journey through life - probably aided by age - really agrees in that mantra, even if others think it trite. And age has also turned me into a grumpy cantankerous creature who is likely to call out what can only be classed as insincere and contradictory behaviour.

In Animal Farm one of the rules painted on the barn walls is famously ‘All Animals are Equal’, which – spoiler alert – had the words ‘… But Some are More Equal Than Others’ added to it. This attitude looks to also apply to certain ‘craft’ beer drinkers who will embrace the joy of a macrobrewed nitro stout but would be quick to jeer their drinking partners if they ordered a pint of Coors, Tuborg or even Heineken no doubt. As I have mentioned above, these beers are no worse or better than Guinness at face value, all just being the less flavoursome versions of their styles.

I also firmly believe that if any of their beloved small breweries produced something with such a basic flavour profile it would get very few stars on certain drink apps and get called out as boring at the very least on social media by those who appear to worship craft beer even as they not-so-secretly drink from the well of St. Arthur within the Gate.

I have tried to get me head around this apparent aberration and misplaced need, simply because it appears out of kilter. Is there something comforting in the colour and texture - perhaps? Is the heritage a factor (although most beers have that)? Is it the taste in itself (as discussed above I don’t think it can be that either)? Perhaps it’s the marketing? Maybe it’s the ritualistic process of the pour? It certainly isn't price related. In truth I don’t know but I do know that, like with the food gurus already mentioned, there should be a degree of self-awareness as to how this looks. To return to a previous topic, imagine if a respected food writer, who focussed entirely on local artisan products was seen eating and waxing lyrically about a Big Mac? There would be uproar and condemnation from all sides of the food sector.

Yet it’s accepted for beer.

As ever, none of this applies to you dear reader unless you feel it does, and only you can decide that ...

-O-

It is also worth reiterating that I don’t dislike Guinness in general, it would be quite difficult to take that stance give how much I read about it and how much I have written about aspects of its history.

But I do hate the drink equivalent of the Cult of Personality that has arisen around it.

I hate some of its drinkers, specifically those who genuinely mock others for their glassware or how their beer was poured – especially on social media.

I hate how some people seem to think they have a psychic ability to know what a Guinness tastes like from a picture alone.

I hate all the marketing guff that has been spouted over many years.

I hate how - by accident or design - it has completely taken over Ireland’s brewing history and eclipsed any hope of our real beer history from shining through.

I hate how it seen as such a huge part of out tourism industry to the detriment of other smaller enterprises, regardless of how lucrative this is for us as a whole.

I hate how it is normally the only stout available in a bar in Ireland outside of the bigger cities.

I hate how people have turned St. Patrick’s Day into ‘St. P-Arthur-ick’s Day’ and how the whole day now revolves around drinking Guinness in every part of the world where that day is celebrated. (I’d almost prefer more green beers!)

I hate how it has become ubiquitous with my country, a place I truly love. Ireland isn’t Guinness and Guinness isn’t Ireland.

And mostly I hate that 'Brand Guinness' – more often not pushed by Guinness themselves, but its followers – has (figuratively) left a sour taste in my mouth, even as I write about it, research it, and on occasion drink it in one form or another, and perhaps in doing so making me just a big a hypocrite as those I have issue with …

-O-

But there are also a few other uniquely Irish reasons for some on this island to dislike the brand, the company, and the beer itself, whether rightly or wrongly.

Back in the day it gained the moniker ‘Protestant Porter’ and catholic drinkers were encouraged to shun it and to even destroy barrels of it on occasion for reasons I won’t go into here. There are many anecdotes and possibly some falsehoods as to why this happened but the term and the tales are still remembered and repeated for right or wrong in certain circles.

They are also blamed by many for closing down most of the other breweries in Ireland and buying them up, or sometimes vice versa. It could be argued that it was shrewd business practices and a better and more consistent product, coupled with a better logistical infrastructure that closed the other breweries, and that Guinness just mobbed up the detritus. My own feeling is that it was a little of both, but that resentment is still there for an albeit small minority of people here.

Some have still not forgiven them for ‘supplying’ the British with truck beds on which the army built armoured cars in the Irish rebellion of 1916. (Some sources report they also used Guinness fermentation vessels on the back of the trucks but this is untrue as it can be clearly seen in photographs that these were the front ends of locomotive engines, although from what source I know not.) There are also those who argue that these trucks were requisitioned from Guinness against their wishes, but either way you can see how all of this might stick in the craw of those of a certain age and historical bent.

Its parent company’s brand monopoly – along with others in fairness – on the bar counters of this country is somewhat unique, as every establishment has had almost the same line-up (give or take a couple of brands) for decades here until the slow rise of the new brewers. Those microbreweries have had immense difficulty getting their taps on display for various reasons, although in truth not all of these issues can be laid at the feet of the big drink companies - as some blame must be apportioned to the bar owners and the punters too, but it explains the dislike it has by many in the microbrewery sector. (I am aware that this lack of choice in Irish pubs is the reason why some feel 'forced' to drink draught Guinness too – as it is perceived to be the best option where the choice of something more flavoursome is missing. Although many of you dismiss The Large Bottle much too quickly in my opinion ...)

These are issues that those from outside Ireland who don’t know much about our beer scene or real brewing history are possibly unaware of (and the huge majority of tourists who drink here wouldn’t care anyway) as they honestly just want to try one brand of beer when they visit – regardless of its past or present image.

-O-

But I truly do believe you should drink what you like, but we also need to be aware of honesty, truth and hypocrisy. To be partisan in the beer world is a difficult thing, as nostalgic needs, marketing and just the plain love of a brand can make you wobble on your high horse and end up under its hooves. You can be fooled by mood, location and your fickle palate – the Guinness I drank in Achill and in Protoras came out of a barrel that originated from the same brewery and, not withstanding a dodgy beer line, the biggest variable in the equation by a wide mile was me, my palate and mood.

If you want to celebrate Guinness by all means do so, but then praise all beers and don’t mock other people’s choices and preach to them about the inadequacies of Coors Light when you are drinking what could be argued is its equivalent in the stout world. (I am acutely aware that all of this may come across as preachy here, but this wasn’t the intention – or not completely anyhow – clarity was.)

Finally, just remember that as much as it is okay for people to like and enjoy Guinness, and millions do as it is a consistent and ‘quality’ product, it is also okay for others to dislike certain aspects of the brand and its drinkers, although ironically many of us are indifferent to the actual product itself at this stage of our beer-soaked journeys …

Love beer. Love all beer …

Liam K

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