Drink
latest update January 2008
Its time to raise a glass to Ireland........ahhhhh!........it time to raise another glass to Ireland.
Here is a brief guide to Irish drinks.
Stout. This is what Guinness is. A dark, creamy textured beer that should be served with a good white frothy head on it. Two similar stouts are brewed in Cork City. Murphy's, which if anything is even creamier, and Beamish .
Smithwicks. Ireland's equivalent of an English beer, full bodied and less bitter than the average English Bitter.
Microbeweries. Ireland's Oldest small independent brewery is Hilden's near Belfast, which started in 1981. Since 1995 small breweries have sprung up around Ireland, starting with The Biddy Early Brewery at Inagh, County Clare. Not all have survived, but at present there are 16 around the country from the Kinsale Brewing Company in the south to Arainn Mhor Brewing Company in Donegal. As well as offering an alternative to the big companies they have revived the Traditional Red Ale style and introduced the brewing of quality wheat beers and lagers to Ireland.
Cider. The Irish Bulmers company in County Tipperary is a separate business to the UK firm, so they changed the name of their main cider a few years ago to Mangers so they could sell it in the UK, and they have done pretty well.Look out for their other ciders like 'Devil's Bit'. In 2007 cider making returned to Northern Ireland. Carson's cider is a fine Real Cider made from local apples in County Armagh www.armaghcider.com .
Whiskey - or in the Gaelic - Uisce Beatha - The Water of Life. Irish Whiskey is an altogether more mellow drink than the Scotch version. Due to it being distilled three times instead of two, and kept for a minimum of 7 years rather than 3 before being sold. However, the Independent Cooley Distillery in County Louth only distills its Whiskies twice.
The Best Irish Whiskeys' (Freewheeler's opinion) are those of Bushmills, the Northern Ireland Distillery, Jameson's, one of the Whiskey's produced at Midleton, County Cork and Tullamore Dew, which is light coloured and deceptively easy to drink, but has just the same alcoholic kick to it.
Liqueurs. The two most popular are Irish Mist, a mixture of whiskey, herbs and honey and Bailey's Irish Cream, a mixture of whiskey and cream.
Poitin. For centuries life in rural Ireland has been enlivened by the battle between the authorities and the makers of Poitin or Poteen, the illegal version of Irish Whiskey. It is brewed as a colourless spirit of fearsome strenght, despite rumours it is not made by fermenting potatoes. Until 1997 it was officially illegal but consumed by most people in 'high places' in Ireland. Since 1997 it has been legal to use the name Poteen and a few legal brands now exist. The Higher percentage alchohol in the legal Poteens, the more genuine they will be. If you want to sample the illegal version it should only be purchased from a reputable supplier, as bad versions can be toxic and extremely harmful, don't touch anything which is at all cloudy.
