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Pass the Murphy's

by Mike Supple
published: 17 Mar 2010       | Comments

Everybody knows the history of St. Patrick's Day, right? It's a Catholic celebration of the day when a young lad named Patrick slew the mighty demon of sobriety and slaked the thirst of a nation all from one goat skin pouch filled with the finest Scotch Irish whiskey. And though this brief history is wildly inaccurate, it's still a great excuse to break the solemnity of Lent and go wild with friends, liquor and meat.

For wine lovers outside of the UK, finding Irish wine with which to celebrate the holiday can prove to be exceedingly difficult. And while there are some great efforts being made to produce quality wine in Ireland, it's probably not really a bad thing if your local shop doesn't carry Longueville House's 2008 Reichsteiner. In fact, you'd be hard pressed to find any wine made in Ireland even in their own shops. But make no mistake, the Irish love a good wine - in fact, wine sales rose from 1.5 million cases in 1990 to 7.3 million cases in 2005 [details]. Of course if you really want to feel Irish about your wine, you can drink what most of the Irish drink: a good bottle from Chile.

But some days we just need a break from wine. Yes, I said it. The swirl, sniff, sip, spit can have the other 364 days of the year - on St. Patrick's Day, I drink beer.

And everybody knows that there's nothing more Irish than a perfect pint of Guinness. The Guinness brewery in Dublin dates back to the 1700s, and according to Wikipedia it is the "best-selling alcoholic drink of all time in Ireland." The biggest setback here is that unless you're drinking in Ireland, your Guinness has no Irish soul. According to Diageo's website (the owners of Guinness), it is "brewed in over 50 countries."

Fortunately you can still turn to Murphy's Irish Stout. Murphy's Stout has been brewed in County Cork using the same recipe since 1856. If you've never had a Murphy's, then make this year the time to try it. Fans of the famous cascading bubbles in a pint of Guinness will be thrilled to know that Murphy's also uses nitrogen gas, so whether on tap or from a draught can, your creamy beer will still form waves of amber bubbles.

Before you dive into your first pint of Murphy's, here's a little background to get your taste buds going. Like Guinness, Murphy's is brewed from roasted barley - which is only used in the brewing of stout. It is dark, thick, creamy and delicious. The key difference is that Murphy's is a little bit lighter - so you can get through more than one before feeling full - and Murphy's tends to have a hint of sweet chocolate milk to it rather than the dark bitter coffee-like roast for which Guinness is known. And did I mention that it's still brewed in Ireland?

However you choose to celebrate, make sure you have your story ready - everybody's Irish on March 17th. And if you do happen to be celebrating in Ireland, do yourself a favor and don't order a Car Bomb. I believe the preferred term over there is Depth Charge.