H: Host
P: Paul Carty, MD Guinness Storehouse
F: Podraig Fox
E: Eibhlin Roche

Hello there and welcome to a special edition of the Lifestyle Show coming to you from the Gravity Bar at the Guinness Storehouse in Dublin. Obviously it’s St Paddy’s Day weekend, and what better place to be? Later in the show, I’m going to be showing you how to pour a perfect pint of the black stuff. But if you think about things that go together, what have you got? Strawberries and cream, you’ve got Morecambe and Wise, and of course you’ve got St Patrick’s Day, Guinness and Dublin, it doesn’t go any better than that does it? Joining me for St Patrick’s Day I’ve got Paul Carty the MD of the Guinness Storehouse and Podraig Fox, so Paul first of all –, why does St Patrick’s Day bring out the perfect Irish man or woman in all of us?

P: Well it’s our national day, it’s a day for which we have great pride, it’s celebrated all around the world, it’s very religious in Ireland and it’s a day of holiday, and we here in Ireland celebrate it with great gusto, it’s the place to be in Dublin over St Patrick’s Day and of course it’s celebrated all around the world

H: And there will be big celebrations in the city here won’t there?

P: There’ll be massive celebrations, yes, the St Patrick’s festival committee do a great job here in Dublin in putting together a fantastic parade, where they have entertainers from all over the world, and it’s celebrated in great style here, so there will be a huge crowd, so if you haven’t booked your ticket you’d better start booking now to get here

H: Podraig is it all about green hats and shamrocks and leprechauns or is there so much more to it than that?

F: There’s absolutely so much more to it, the parade takes about 2 and a half hours, it covers so many different social groups, not just from Ireland but from all around the world, Irish emigrants. Last year we even had a group from Iraq coming in, so it covers absolutely every corner of the globe. Not just about the green hats but about you know Guinness, about people having a good time, catching up with their roots or even visiting Ireland for the first time, it’s the best way to get an introduction to the country

H: Well I’ve got some questions coming in, Martin says, “which is the biggest party, New York or Dublin and which came first?” Because the New York celebrations are huge aren’t they?

P: Yes America really celebrates St Patrick’s very very well. New York and Chicago are enormous events, and Dublin comes behind that I’m afraid to say, but America is an enormous event

H: Doesn’t Chicago even dye their river green at some point?

P: So I believe yes, I must get over there and see it

H: Don’t do that with the Liffey here though, presumably?

P: Not yet

H: Shane from Guilford has sent us a question, wants to know “why don’t you think that the English, the Scots and the Welsh have parties on the same kind of scale? Why don’t we have a huge St George’s Day in England, why do you do it so well?”

P: That’s interesting, it’s just something that’s caught on but actually – St George’s Day is celebrated internationally more so than it is in the UK, for example I worked in Bahrain, and St George’s was a massive day in Bahrain, as an example. So people tend to celebrate the national day, they become more patriotic as they’re overseas or ex-patriots and all of that

H: Excellent well we have got so much to talk about, with the celebrations not only going on in Dublin but there’s celebrations literally going on here at the Guinness Storehouse as well. The Guinness Storehouse itself it’s the number one visitor attraction in Ireland, and earlier on we took some pictures just to show you exactly what it’s like

Pictures

So you can see there’s plenty to see and do here at the Storehouse. Now Paul has been managing director of the Storehouse for some years, in fact even oversaw the vision of the thing being built in the first place. Paul that was quite a vision, and now you’ve got what nearly a million visitors a year?

P: Yes that’s right, we’re up at 850,000 visitors a year now and certainly going towards the million, and yes it started life at 400,000 visitors in the hold Hop Store, so we literally had to make a bigger building to cope with the number of people that were –

H: It was bursting at the seams really wasn’t it?

P: It was bursting at seams at they were beating a path to our door, so we had to make it bigger, so hence we created this, the Guinness Storehouse which actually suited very well because the building as you can see is very contemporary, and we wanted to portray Guinness in a contemporary manner.

H: What I like about it is the bar up here is like the top, the head of the pint of Guinness so to speak, and the other six floors underneath are also the glass bit is like a pint of Guinness isn’t it?

P: Yes you’re quite right, if you come into the atrium, we have, the whole design of the interior of the building is in the shape of a pint glass, and you go through the pint glass on your journey and you end up here in Gravity and get the perfect pint of Guinness as a reward for your journey through the pint glass. But actually if we were to fill that pint glass and we must do it one day, it would take over 13 million pints of Guinness to fill that glass. We must do that one day!

H: That would take quite a long time to actually pour as well considering what, it’s a 120 seconds to actually pour the perfect pint of Guinness, and we’ll be seeing that perfect pour a little bit later on. David has sent us a question saying, “Can you actually see Guinness being made here at the Storehouse?”

P: Well you’re physically in the brewery here, you’re as close as you’ll get, you’re in the brewery, we make the Guinness right behind where we’re sitting here, you can see the ingredients and the brewing process but you can’t actually go into the Guinness factory where it’s being made, for obvious reasons nowadays, but yes you can as good as see it

H: So that’s obviously a real big party going on this weekend, but it’s not just here at the Storehouse is it, across Dublin as a whole there’s big parties going on?

F: Absolutely, there is so much stuff to do in Dublin over that weekend, you will never be stuck or you will never say “I’m bored” in Dublin over St Patrick’s Day weekend

H: And to be fair it’s across the whole year because Ireland and Dublin especially attracts visitors the whole year round, this is a very special weekend in terms of celebration?

F: Yes this is absolutely huge, I mean you’ve got the parade starting at midday on St Patrick’s Day, that runs till about 2.30 / 3pm, and not only that if you’re feeling slightly energetic you can do the harbour to harbour walk, from the Howth harbour in North Dublin, all the way down to Dunlaoghaire harbour in South Dublin, which will take you all along the beautiful coastline of Dublin

H: Beautiful

F: On top of that then the day after St Patrick’s day we will have a massive fireworks celebration down in the docklands which you’ll be able to see from anywhere in the city

H: I would have thought here in the Storehouse, up in the Gravity bar’s probably the best place to see it?

F: Absolutely there is no better advantage point to see the fireworks than from up here, especially if you’re enjoying a pint while you’re watching it

H: Exactly.

F: There’s music festivals going on all round, the top comedians in Ireland are doing a comedy circus just down the road from us here in the Vicarage Street Theatre, still tickets available for that I believe, and just there’s a brilliant atmosphere, everybody’s relaxed, everybody’s on holidays and basically we’re all just going to get along fantastically for a weekend

H: And of course what Paul it’s 50 minutes from London Heathrow?

P: Absolutely it couldn’t be closer, we’re your nearest neighbour in the UK bits and want you all to be here, it’s great

H: It’s great, and that’s the style of the Irish, the Irish welcome is the all-important thing and that is what a lot of us come over for. So then a lot for the weekend visitor and a lot throughout the year as well

P: Yes indeed, you mean a lot of festivals are there?

H: Well no, the welcome is there and there’s so much to do?

P: Yes it is, very much so, I mean Ireland is, and Dublin in particular is a city that welcomes. I think Dublin is a fantastic – very romantic city and there’s a lot of things happening, you can go to some great restaurants and great bars, UK is our nearest neighbour and by far our biggest market so we’d love to see you coming over more and more for weekends

H: Well Paul thank you very much indeed for joining us. Coming up we’ll hear a little bit more about the history of Guinness and the history of the brand from Eibhlin Roche, but for now we promised you the perfect pint and how to pour the perfect pint. Podraig it’s not easy is it?

F: It’s certainly not, it’s a highly skilled art form

H: But he showed me how to do it just a little bit earlier, take a look at this

Footage

H: Right well let’s find out what it takes to make the perfect pint then, Podraig, start pouring – why does it take so long to get the perfect pint of Guinness?

F: Basically it takes 119.5 seconds to pour a perfect pint of Guinness because there are six steps involved. First step is your glass, it’s got to be cool, clean and branded because there is nothing worse than drinking Guinness out of a warm, wet non-branded glass

H: I can imagine yes

F: Second step is very important, it’s the angle, you’ve got to put it at a 45 degree angle underneath the tap, it’s the perfect angle for pouring the Guinness in, and of course our third step then is just to start to pour, so basically let the Guinness hit off the glass, let it just cascade off the side of it. It’s running up to half there at a beautiful 45 degree angle, so what I’m going to do now is I’m just slowly going to start straightening it up, and as it gets to the top of the harp, I’ve finished the first part of my pour, and then –

H: How long does it take to learn?

F: Basically we’ve trained here for quite a long! So we’ve been practicing quite hard at it

H: Fair enough

F: But basically anybody can learn it and if you come to visit here we’ll offer you the chance to learn to pour your own pint, especially over the St Patrick’s day weekend we estimate that we’ll probably end up teaching about 900, maybe more people how to pour their own pint of Guinness in here

H: Is it true that they actually use water from the Liffey?

F: That is not true at all, it’s one of those urban myths that people think it starts from Liffey water

H: Possibly so. And would you say it tastes the same wherever you’re drinking it in the world

F: Absolutely. I mean we brew most of the Guinness around the world here in Dublin and basically it’s all down to how it’s served
H: Ok so we’re at this stage and I can see it kind of pouring down, what happens after that?

F: Basically what we call this is the tingle of anticipation, because if you are a Guinness drinker, you can see this settling in front of you –

H: Absolutely

F: But you can’t touch it so it’s almost there. What’s actually happening here is that most beers are carbon dioxide based so all the bubbles go up the top and create a head that way, Guinness is actually a nitrogenated beer, so what’s actually happening is that the nitrogen, which is about 60% is mixing with the 40% carbon dioxide, to find their place in the glass, so what you’re getting is sort of like the way the currents in the ocean work with warm water hitting against cold water, hitting the ocean like that, it’s pretty much what you’re getting in a Guinness glass except replacing warm water and cold water with nitrogen and carbon dioxide so you get a nice, creamy, nitrogenated head on the top, with loads of little bubbles of carbon dioxide head

H: Well I’m hoping you’re going to put a shamrock in the top of that for me as well

F: I can certainly do that for you

H: But there are other designs as well aren’t there?

F: Absolutely, you can put the harp, last year a guy won a competition in America for the best artwork for doing a beautiful picture of a toucan, and one of the guys who works with us here can put his name and phone number on the top of a pint as well

H: And then give it to the girl presumably?

F: Absolutely

H: I understand, got it. Right so we’re nearly there aren’t we

F: Just finished step 4 which is to let it sit in front of the customer for a little bit of time, let them salivate over the prospect. So our next step then is going to be the top-off, and when we top it off, step 5, you push backwards on the tap, and what we do is we call this back for blackSo I’m going to just try and be a little bit fancy, I’m just trying to give you your shamrock. Basically the shamrock is like a figure of eight, back around on itself, and down to finish the step, so there we go, back to the centre of the glass, get one leaf, two leaf, three leaf and a stem at the bottom. Top it off, so that’s just coming over the top of the glass, and step 6 is to set it down in front of the customer like that

H: That’s fantastic, and I’m going to take it off now, here we go – cheers

H: And there it is, our perfect pint poured by Podraig, thank you I’ll have a go with that later. Welcome back to the show. Eibhlin Roche has joined us who is the Guinness company archivist, a kind of historian so-to-speak if you like. We’ll talk to you in a second, if that’s ok Eibhlin, but I’ve got a question from Harry in Newcastle who says “why is it that no matter where you go in the world, there is always an Irish pub?” Podraig you might want to field that one

F: Well it’s one thing that the Irish people have always been really good at exporting, it’s good humour, a good crack, all of that, and there’s no better place to find that around the world than an Irish pub, and there are Irish pubs all over the world, from Argentina to Africa, and even two years ago there was one opened up in Siberia, so that’s probably the coldest Irish pub in the world. There’s 7 in Florence alone, I think Hamburg in Germany has the most Irish pubs in the whole world

H: Wow

F: It’s huge, everybody loves them, it’s a place for Irish people to meet when they go abroad and it’s a place for everybody to go and just try and sample some of what we have here

H: It does sometimes feel like its caricature Ireland though but I guess people don’t really mind about that?

F: Well to be honest most of the Irish pubs are actually opened by Irish people based on pubs here in Dublin, so the idea is that the atmosphere you’ll get abroad is the very same as if you were to walk into Temple Bar and order a pint in there

H: Just one very quick question before we deal with the history of Guinness, what is the “crack?”

F: Well that’s something you have to find out for yourself, you’ve got to go to a pub, you’ve got to talk to people, you’ll discover it yourself by the end of the night

H: Well there you go, there’s a challenge for the weekend. Eibhlin let’s talk to you, the history of Guinness goes back to 1759, Arthur Guinness – take it away!

E: That’s right almost 250 years ago to the day, you’ve the young Arthur Guinness, only aged 34 at the time, pretty much riding his horse in the front gate of St James’s Gate brewery here, and he signed an incredible 9000 year lease on the St James’s Gate brewery site

H: So there’s a brewery here anyway, a kind of micro-site brewery anyway wasn’t there?

E: That’s correct, what he would have done was signed a lease on a 4 acre site but it was actually an old, dis-used brewery that hadn’t been in production for at least about 10 years, so certainly wasn’t a case of he was developing a new thriving industry, to put it in context there’s about 10 other breweries along James’s Street alone at that same time

H: So why was it that Guinness and the black stuff and the pint that was very different, became so popular?

E: It was really his kind of entrepreneurial flair, I think the fact that he actually signed a 9000 year lease says a huge amount in itself

H: Absolutely

E: But he was also one of the first Dublin brewers to concentrate solely on brewing this relatively new 18th century drink called porter, which is now I suppose the stout and the Guinness that we know and love, and he was one of the very first brewers to concentrate solely on brewing this new drink, and it just became so popular and I guess his recipe was the best

H: Course it became quite well known on the continent by around about the year 1815 so by that time 75 years into production it was already known quite a long way across the world?

E: That’s right, absolutely, you mentioned 1815 and we’ve a diary from a soldier in the battle of Waterloo telling about how he had been injured at the battle of Waterloo and was drinking a bottle of Guinness as it would have been then, to aid his recovery, so certainly by the turn of the 19th century it was being sold right across the world

H: And we all know Guinness, I mean we all recognise Guinness advertising, it’s been going on and it’s won awards for many many years, Guinness advertising, I think that just shows what a global brand it is

E: Absolutely and what’s interesting is that Guinness didn’t actually start advertising until 1929, so for the first 150 years of Guinness’s history it didn’t need to advertise because it was so well known, but then it just started advertising in all markets across the world, and the very famous Guinness animals dominated Guinness advertising for the first 30 years

H: Well I remember the toucan of course, because the toucan when I was a kid, that was a very famous – and then we’ve had the horses and everything else, and you’ve just got another award winning commercial as well really haven’t you?

E: That’s right, Evolution, a UK advert, absolutely fantastic ad, and it’s really just the latest in a line of caliber of Guinness advertising

H: We’ve skipped the whole kind of hundred years in there, because by 1833 it was the biggest brewery in Ireland wasn’t it?

E: That’s right

H: And then what by 2000 and whatever the Guinness Storehouse has become the number one visitor attraction in Ireland – it just shows that the brand goes from strength to strength, to strength doesn’t it?

E: It is absolutely, and you mentioned early 19th century there became the largest brewery in Ireland, but what few people don’t know is that Guinness is actually the largest brewery in the world for about 50 years, from about the 1880s onwards, and we were selling and distributing Guinness to 150 countries around the world, so pretty much the same as today but an enormous enterprise

H: Well if we concentrate on the glass for a second, George from London’s asked a really good question, “if you look at the Guinness glass it’s got a harp on it – is that the official Irish symbol?”

E: It is the official Irish symbol but Guinness actually adopted the harp as their symbol back in the 1860s, and it’s actually an interesting story around that that when the Irish free state was set up in the 1920s, so they had the new Irish government, they also wanted to use the harp as the Irish symbol. I suppose the harp had always been a traditional Celtic Irish symbol, but because Guinness had trademarked theirs in the 1860s the government had to flip theirs the other way, so if you look at your Irish passport or an Irish Euro coin, you’ll notice that the harp is flipped a different way to the Guinness one, so we always say Guinness got there first.

H: Yes exactly right. Johnny from Cheltenham, here’s a question for you Podraig, this is a bit of a controversial one I have to say. He says his girlfriend claims that St Patrick was an Englishman is that true?

P: Well she is almost correct he wasn’t strictly Irish, If anything he was Welsh or of Scottish extraction but from the British Isles.

H: So he definitely wasn’t English that is what you are saying. They are holding there hands up at that on saying no he is not English. When we mentioned that to someone earlier on they went “No it’s a lie”

P: He is actually a sort of international man of mystery Wales to Scottish origins possibly, educated in France, he spoke Latin when he came over and actually had to communicate in a mixture of Latin and hand signals until he actually learnt Irish to communicate with people here in his later years.

H: He is celebrated every single year on March 17th, St Patrick’s Day. Here in Dublin is possibly the biggest celebration but as we have mentioned all the way around the world.

P: Absolutely I think that almost every country around the world will serve a pint of Guinness, but also celebrates St Patrick’s Day. Not only that there are only 2 countries in the world that have St Patrick’s Day as a national holiday and that is Ireland and Montserrat in the Caribbean. They not only have St Patrick as the patron saint but have the Harp as their national symbol on their passports as well.

H: I imagine March 17th is a bit warmer out there.

P: Just a little bit, yes

H: So we’ve heard about the history of it, in terms of where Guinness goes from here and how they build on that kind of brand, because it’s one of the most famous beers in the world I guess it’s got to be a stepping stone, one after another going forward?

E: Absolutely, I think throughout the whole 250 years of Guinness history, Guinness has continuously evolved and innovation has always been key to the core of the brand, be it through innovative advertising or new products

H: Can I raise one innovation with you, and it’s an innovation that of course Guinness started with – widget, and the whole draft thing in a can. How did that come about?

E: Very very famous invention, there was recently a poll done in the UK of the best, 100 best inventions in the 20th century and the widget was actually voted number one and the internet was voted number two, so –

H: Goes to show doesn’t it

E: It does! An incredibly important invention. It was invented by Guinness here in St James’s Gate, back in the late 80s and it was really a mechanism to give, for people to be able to enjoy their creamy pint of Guinness draft not just solely in the pub but in the home as well

H: So there’s also extra cold, Guinness Extra Cold – is that because it’s popular elsewhere in hot countries?

P: It’s mostly in the UK Extra Cold would be our biggest seller, it’s - a lot of UK drinkers would be normally lager drinkers, which is sold a little bit colder than Guinness. Guinness Draft here in Dublin would be served at about 6 degrees centigrade whereas the Guinness Extra Cold would be served at 3 ½ degrees, that’s basically just to meet people’s different tastes.
H: So incredibly popular in hot countries like Africa because it is sold all over the world – why do you think it’s so popular in the hotter countries?

P: I think in Africa it’s sold mainly as a refreshing drink. People finish their day at work, they go back to the home and they have their drink. And also in Africa I think it is sold as a relly good drink for health, not so much healthwise but people feel an extra sense of power. REMOVE !!!
It is a meaty drink, let’s face it ! REMOVE !!

H: It’s the drink that’s got it. Back to St Patrick’s Day, back to St Patrick’s Day celebrations, we are talking here at the Guinness Storehouse; this is possibly the centre of Dublin where it’s all happening. Just remind us the kind of celebrations that we’ll be able to see?

F: Well it’s just kicking off downstairs at the moment, but we’re going to have so much live music, but not only that but tomorrow on St Patrick’s Day itself we’re taking on Italy in the Rugby in the final game of the Six Nations

H: Well that’s true

E: Great stuff

F: So hopefully we’ll get a good result in that and win the Championship so you can watch that here while sampling the smoked salmon and brown bread. You can also learn how to pour your own pint of Guinness as you’ve done earlier

H: Absolutely

F: It’s a holiday for a lot of people, and don’t forget as well 10 people are going to get to start their own brew of Guinness on St Patrick’s Day as well, we’ve got live music of all different sorts of genres, there’s a mixture of hip hop and traditional, not only that you’ve got your tastings of the extra stout and the foreign extra stout and basically you can watch the fireworks from up here as well

H: If we want to find out more about what’s happening here at St Patrick’s Day at the Storehouse, is there a web address we can go to?

F: Absolutely just click on www.guiness-storehouse.com and you’ll find all the information you need there

H: That’s brilliant Podraig thank you very much. If you go to the link at the bottom of the page you’ll find that there as well and you can click through to that page no problem at all. Now I know in Gaelic there is a special word for cheers isn’t there, can you teach it to me because it looks complicated on the page?

F: Well it’s actually quite simple, all you have to do is look the person in the eye and say “slodger”

H: So it’s slodger?

F: Exactly

H:Alright well grab your pint

E: Your pints

H: Slodger, happy St Patrick’s Day!