Last week my wife was on a work trip to Dublin which gave me the great excuse to fly over for the weekend to meet her. I’d never been before but have always had every intention to visit. Whilst many cities can be heavily tied to beer tourism, I can’t think of a city so tightly bound to a brewery to the extent Dublin is with Guinness. Obviously, there is far more to the city than this one beer, but with only a couple days to explore and bearing a hefty cold, I figured I’d take a bit of time to reflect.
Friday morning I arrived at Gatwick far too early, 80% out of pure excitement, 20% just to soak in a breakfast at Wetherspoons. A lot can be said and debated about Spoons, but in the departure lounge for me I feel it is fair game. We are all aware of how ‘place’ plays on the senses, so to calibrate myself, an airport Guinness felt appropriate. It was exactly what you’d think far from the best but certainly not the worst.
My next taste of the good stuff on Irish ground would be whilst sharing a can with my wife at dinner with our relatives. I’d always imagined it would have been a far more typical experience in a classic pub but this was actually far more enjoyable. We hadn’t seen each other for five days, the longest apart since we got married earlier this year, and to finally be sharing something again just felt right.
Saturday morning we were off to The Guinness Storehouse, which was the only planned element of the trip on my part. I was tempted to not bother as I expected it to be both busy and over stimulating and not in a way I’d enjoy. Not to sound snobby or pretentious, but I also assumed it would be quite pedestrian. However, both my more beer-oriented friends and those who couldn’t care less had strongly advised going, and I am so glad we did. The tour itself frames both Guinness and Dublin in a fascinating way beyond how the beer is made. There are two particularly interesting elements that would be hard to find at any other brewery tour, the barrel-making and marketing exhibits, these were my highlights. The tour famously ends with a free pint at the top of the building which has a fantastic panoramic view of the city. Whilst there was nowhere to sit down, the beer was very fresh and beautifully poured.
Later that afternoon, after some sightseeing at Trinity College, we figured we would take a break for a beer. As my wife had been working out of the Dublin office that week, her local colleagues had provided a genuine list of recommended spots. Top of that list was Kehoes Pub, which, though there wasn’t an extensive availability of beers compared to your typical London pub, had a dynamic range – with one IPA, one red ale, one larger, a cider and of course an array of Guinness taps. The pub is one of those beautiful classic types that fill the city, and, whilst it was very busy, the staff’s efficiency was remarkable. As an Irish red ale virgin I went with a pint of Smithwick’s, which was a real treat as I felt it had smoothness (comparable in a way to Guinness) but also really balanced with delicate malt and bitterness.
After walking around the city all weekend, one of the learnings for me is how genuinely gorgeous the pubs are. What I saw was a great number that have a unique timeless quality that I think many London pubs fail at. Rather than plaster a ton of nostalgic trinkets around the place and call it a day, I think these have a level of curation that builds a story of the place through different points in time. There is a commonality across the city, but they seem to have developed such individual character that any touch of a corporate chain is lost. Which brings me full circle to Wetherspoons, which from the carpet to the light fixtures has become so recognisable, and floods consumers with a huge range of beer that so often overlaps as the same product.
So, does Guinness taste better in Dublin? I couldn’t say as I was full of cold, but they’ve certainly made it better to drink it there than anywhere else.
Babette’s Yeast 
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