Taste of a pint of Guinness in Ireland vs. the UK?

tinytobe

Just wondering, either it's just me but does a pint of Guinness in Ireland taste differntly than in the UK?

Reason for asking, is that I drink Guinness in both the UK as well as Ireland and think that it does taste different in both countries. This is a surprise to me as the Guinness trucks are seemingly regularly travelling from the brewery to the ferry port in Dublin for delivery to the UK.

Bobson Dugnutt

There’s an awful lot of seafóid talked about Guinness. It’s a mass produced beer designed to be popular and to be a consistent product. All that nostalgic nonsense about an auld man in a waistcoat who has been perfecting his craft since he started working in the bar as a 14 year old orphan is just marketing rubbish. Or that it tastes better in Dublin than it does in Belfast. Total claptrap.

baxterooneydoody

It tastes absolutely sh1te no matter where it's drank

Cluedo Monopoly

I had a very nice pint of Guinness in 2 pubs in London about 2 weeks ago. I was very impressed.

Feisar

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122547872#Comment_122547872

This is it, back in the day it was a "live" product but now it's as homogenous as possible.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKDwwVR5fd4&t=167s

silliussoddius

Back in the day pubs used to bottle their own Guinness, a lot of the guff about it is just nitrogen and marketing.

Hungry Burger

They have a different variation in the UK though, Guinness Extra Cold.

I’ve drank it in the UK and it’s shite but I’d imagine that has more to do with the Publicans in England not cleaning the lines enough and the Guinness not having the same draw it would here. The extra cold gimmick is just to try mask the bad taste of the stuff.

I drink the pint bottles of Guinness now, far superior stout.

Bobson Dugnutt

It’s now the biggest selling beer in Britain. They wouldn’t be drinking if it was crap. There might be dirty glassware, poorly cleaned lines, or temperature set wrong, but that’s the same anywhere.

Kurooi

I've found a noticeable difference between Irish establishments too, I suspect between fresh kegs and not. A busy place will be cracking dozens open every night while a less so might hold one keg for days. Just a theory.

Electric Nitwit

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122547937#Comment_122547937

Used to work in bar in the UK, the extra cold actually comes from the same barrels, it's just cooled in the pipes on the way to the tap. So, in theory, it shouldn't taste any different

Not made with hands

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122547985#Comment_122547985

During the COVID I was supping out of kegs that were tapped / untapped several times and driven from place to place over a period of maybe a month. Didn't seem to affect the juice.

Vestiapx

Guiness used to be a live beer bottled in the pub and the two part pour was the two types of the beer

Fresh and aged . Now it's gibberish

Still a fine pint but two part pour is speil

Olympush

I would think a lot of it is in the pouring. Even lager in the UK is usually dire with little or no head on it. Guinness is my go to pint here but I wouldn’t touch it with a barge pole when visiting the UK

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122547946#Comment_122547946

a friend used to run a pub in england, and he said you should never order a guinness in the UK until you see someone else ordering one first. his rationale was not so much to see how good the bartender was at pouring it, it was more about it sitting in the lines too long. in ireland, you can be guaranteed that they're poured regularly and cleaned regularly, but that in pubs in england where it would not be as popular, you might not know how long the keg has been there.

he's an opinionated lad, mind!

Electric Nitwit

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122548998#Comment_122548998

I think there's a lot of truth in that. Even in Ireland you can get a bad pint somewhere that doesn't sell a lot, like hotel bars for example

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122548998#Comment_122548998

It's a huge beer in England now so the idea it's likely to be sitting in the lines is no more true than here. It will be pouring fine everywhere except a certain type of disco bar (for want of a better term).

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122548979#Comment_122548979

Generally no respect for glassware or beer head in England. Everything comes in straight up glasses with no head thanks to their ale culture. Slowly getting better though.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122549076#Comment_122549076

I was told that 20 years ago FWIW

Olympush

There’s actually an account on twitter (I refuse to call it X) called “**** London Guinness” Tells you all you need to know really - I rest my case! 😂

tinytobe

It may only be down to personal taste, maybe to external factors, however my experience was that a pint of Guinness tastes better in London than in Dublin. I also have no idea why this is the case.

Pls forgive me for that opinion.

It may also be that the Guinness in Dublin is more original and authenic, and the Guinness in London more adjusted to an international taste?

Ray Palmer

There is a load of tosh about Guinness for decades.

A huge factor is the UK tend to use cold filtering on beers as they don't have cold rooms like Ireland. A colder Guinness does taste different and less flavorful.

If you go to the games place in Buskers, Fleet Street, Dublin you can get the same baddy poured pints as London. It is shocking but as many of the customers are British stag does it doesn't seem to matter. Barely any settle time and straight pour top up with concave heads when it does settle

Sgt Hartman

When I lived in the UK for a brief period back in 2002 the barman in my local would always stick a Guinness on for me as soon as I walked in the door. Unfortunately he would just put a lager glass under the Guinness tap and stick the tap on, leaving the Guinness pour vertically into the glass. I used to be horrified but he was such a nice fella I didn’t have the heart to tell him that he hadn’t a clue how to pour Guinness. The pint itself actually looked fine despite the horrendous pour method.
The worst pint of Guinness I ever got however was here in Ireland in The Summit Inn in Howth a few years back. It was at room temperature with a sad looking gassy head. I never went back to The Summit Inn after that. The pint off Guinness I had afterwards in The Bloody Stream pub was a thing of beauty. Perfect chilled with a snow white creamy head, probably the third best pint I ever had. Second best was in The Weaver’s Inn in Newmarket on Fergus which is now sadly closed. The best I ever had was in Joe Watty’s in Inis Mór.

silliussoddius

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122550723#Comment_122550723

Yeah, pubs that don't care about repeat customers will serve you any old slop whereas places that have repeat customers will care a bit more. I also thought there was collaboration between Diageo and BOC/Sureflow for quality control relating to clean lines etc.

Fr Tod Umptious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122551305#Comment_122551305

The pint itself actually looked fine despite the horrendous pour method.

Which proves that the pour is just tosh.

A place I worked in had a guy who always wanted his Guinness poured straight.

And by the time it had settled it was no different than ones that were poured in two steps.

ednwireland

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122549076#Comment_122549076

only in the south, ale in the north should have a head on it. the bitterness goes into the head and then you get a smooth tasting beer below.

Thelonious Monk

i think the quality of guinness has improved so much over the years that it's pretty good everywhere now. in London i used to know a few pubs that had really good guinness.

but personally in ireland anyway i think the days of pints being amazing in one place and not in another are pretty much over, the standard has come up everywhere.

breezy1985

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122551414#Comment_122551414

In the UK most in pubs the lines are still cleaned by the landlord. Very different here where I have never worked in a place where the manager/publican cleaned the lines.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122551460#Comment_122551460

I've that so many times over the years. None of the "Guinness experts" at the bar could blind taste or visually pick out the one pour pints.

BaywatchHQ

I walked past a Guinness truck in a loyalist town recently. Loyalists must forget about their political agenda when alcohol is concerned. Unless they drink it because they know about the Guinness family roots being from Co. Down. I can't remember if the family were Catholic or Protestant.

Fr Tod Umptious

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122552213#Comment_122552213

I can't remember if the family were Catholic or Protestan

Oh they were very much part of the Protestant Ascendancy.

Up until the 1960s little or none of the office and higher up jobs in Guinness were held by Catholics.

As for people in loyalist towns drinking Guinness, I doubt they care where it originated.

tinytobe

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122552213#Comment_122552213

Did drinking Guinness ever have any role during the Troubles in Northen Ireland? Did prefering a certain beer put you either to the one or the other side?

I always thought Guinness would be drunk by Republicans, Loyalists would drink Harp?

But wasn't Harp from Dundalk?