As promised, here's a post solely dedicated to Guinness. Dream come true, I know.
We went to the Guinness Storehouse on Tuesday, and I adored it.
I'm going to preface this with a little life story.
Guinness was the first beer I ever tasted. I studied abroad in Tours, France the summer after my freshman year of college. A couple of nights into the trip, we went to a bar. Aside from a sip of champagne from my parents' glass on vacation in England, I'd never had a sip of alcohol. Well, the sheltered kid that I was, I didn't even know what kinds of beers there were. So I walk up to the bar, trying to play it cool, and stared wide-eyed at all of the beers. I didn't recognize a single one. Uh oh. And THEN, I spotted the Guinness logo. The one beer I recognized. So I ordered a pint of Guinness. I watched, mesmerized, as the bartender poured the beer, and then made the little shamrock at the top. Too cool. I whisked away that beer, ready to plunge, and I took a sip (again, trying to look smooth).
Oh. my. goodness. That was the absolute worst thing I had ever tasted in my life. Little did I know that Guinness was the worst choice for someone who had never tasted beer before. I was scared of beer for a very long time, mainly because I thought all beer would taste like Guinness. Fortunately, my friends, Bud Light exists.
Life story over.
The Guinness Storehouse is pretty incredible. It's similar to the Heineken Experience and the Coca Cola World in Atlanta, but in my opinion, MUCH cooler.
Truth.
Fun fact that I learned on my free walking tour on Monday. Originally, St. Patrick's day wasn't centered around drinking. It wasn't until the holiday was exported to the US that it became a big drinking holiday. Our Irish tour guide wanted to extend his thanks.
I even made it into a Guinness poster. Framing this one.
My favorite part of the visit was by far the Guinness Academy. Basically, we had the option of either having someone serve us our free beer, or we could attend the Academy and learn to pour it ourselves. I'm all about learning life skills, so I decided to go with the schooling.
There are 6 steps to pouring the perfect pint. Basically, you pour part of it, then you have to let it sit for a minute. Then you top off the last 3rd. Then, you have to place it on the bar without spilling any (something I've seen many a bartender do...).
Anyways, yours truly, passed with FLYING colors and is now an accredited perfect pint crafter.
Just check out that form, folks.
Poise.
Concentration.
Dedication.
Expertise.
There she blows. My perfect pint.
Here is a picture of me and my certificate. Again, can't wait to put a frame on it.
So I'm going to be honest. I was not looking forward to drinking my Guinness. You could even say that I was scared. I had already told Emily that we were going to need to budget a large amount of time to finish the beers.
Anyways, I cringed as I took that first sip, and much to my surprise...it tasted good. More than surprised, I was shocked. Couldn't believe it. Guinness actually tastes good? QUOI?
En fait, I very much enjoyed drinking that pint and treated myself to a few more over the course of the rest of our trip.
When in Rome.
The top of the Guinness Storehouse is really cool because it's a 360 degree view of all of Dublin. We went up there after finishing our beers at the Academy, and it was really pretty.
Cheers.
Luv,
Sarah
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