An Irish toast, with
beer worth drinking

Though plenty of unfortunate things happen when Americans show our love for the Irish, one offense truly stands out.

“The worst thing we've done about St. Paddy's Day is to put green food coloring in bad beer,” laments Thomas Dalldorf, editor and publisher of Celebrator Beer News. “The Irish think we're absolutely foolish for doing that.”

There are parades and songs and the chance to dust off that clover-green turtleneck you'd never wear otherwise. But let's face it: Beer plays a big role — a defining role — in how we celebrate St. Patrick's Day.

If we're lauding a country with such great beer, why do so many of us drink gallons of swill come March 17?

The prevailing theory is that the day might, just might, have something more to do with getting plastered than with the originally religious overtones of honoring the Emerald Isle's patron saint. I'd prefer to think maybe it's just because we don't know better.

And there's plenty of propaganda afoot to confuse us. Beer distributors are notorious for carpeting bars and restaurants with the usual displays of shamrocks and leprechauns — “Some of them were just offensive,” says Ciaran Staunton, owner of O'Neill's bar in New York City — to temporarily re-theme drinking holes of any stripe as Irish Central for a day.

It's hard to find much of an economic or cultural link between tepid mass-market monsters like Budweiser and Coors and Irish culture — though Guinness, perhaps in a mark of its own falling star, has been licensed to brew Bud in a Kilkenny facility since 1986, and Coors does manufacture George Killian's Irish Red. That hasn't stopped beer's biggest names from trying to latch onto a wee bit of Irish glory.

Worse, Ireland's own crown brews — Guinness and Harp — have been commandeered by Diageo, the world's largest liquor firm. That brings with it the sort of marketing muscle that makes purists lament the demise of much-loved slogans like “My Goodness, My Guinness!”

"Those don't even exist anymore,” says Kevin Sullivan of Seattle beer merchant Bottleworks. “It's just 'Sale!'”

Even so, I'd like to think that quality can trump quantity on St. Patrick's Day.  Why not make it a moment to revel in great beer -- instead of a great many beers?

Guinness is struggling with market share, but it still dominates the Irish market and some 12 million kegs are produced annually. Few other authentic Irish brews even make it to these shores, and then only in tiny quantities.

And frankly, it's hard to beat a pint of Guinness, with its smooth, nitrogen-enhanced head and eat-with-a-spoon flavor. But in the interest of good beer, we decided to consider some alternatives.

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