Good whisky and whiskey people of planet Earth. We’re in Dublin this weekend to help the local populace drink the town dry of Jameson in honour of the biggest national celebration of them all – Paddy’s Day. Our friends from Irish Distillers have prepared a bewildering array of excellent and fun things to do and we shall report as we go along. So check back on this post over the weekend, we’ll keep adding embarrassing photos and drunken thoughts. Also, if you have any questions for the ID crew, we’ll get them answered for you. Let the craic begin.
Saturday 12:15pm
The flight from Edinburgh was on one of those small planes with propellers instead of jet engines. This was so scary that the only way to calm the nerves was to have Irish Coffees as soon as we arrived at the hotel. We thought they were going to be inconspicuous but instead they arrived looking very much like booze and leaving no doubt as to who’s the two biggest swines in this city.
Saturday 12:27pm
The Irish Coffee above:
25ml Jameson
2 teaspoons of brown sugar
Double espresso
Whipped cream
Coffee beans to garnish
Simples. The barman says it’s all in the quality of the whiskey and the coffee. We’re going to get along just fine.
Saturday 12:52pm
Fun fact: The green man sound effect as heard all around Dublin is the same as the sound of plasma gun in all 1990′s sci-fi films. EWB – bringing the useless and mostly made-up facts to you since 2009. You’re welcome.
Saturday 1:17pm
Remember. Air travel + caffeine + sugar + ethanol = coma.
Saturday 2:26pm
1st Jameson of the trip
Saturday 2:50pm
Dave the glass artist telling us all about his work for Jameson. He uses Victorian techniques which sounds like a lot of work and wouldn’t recommend trying it at home. Btw, you can still enter the caption competition and win a bottle of Jameson design by Dave here.
Saturday 3:25pm
Lucas gold-plating some glass. His skill in all things under the sun is only matched by his good looks. The glass artist Dave learned a thing or two and the good people at Jameson already know who’s going to be designing next year’s bottle.
Saturday 4:54pm
Following the glass craft masterclass at a cracking pub (no he didn’t, yes he did!), a few drams, some cocktails, an Irish coffee and generous amounts of the sweet creative Irish air, here’s what we’ve come up with to keep the craic in check. The Irish Credit Crunch Box. Every time one of us (Graeme, Lucas, Miss Whisky, Alex) says anything in an Irish accent or uses Irish slang, a quid or a euro has to go in the box. We reckon by Monday the box may not be enough. In fact, we’re planning to cure the Irish economy with the proceeds. So far it’s Graeme – 2, Lucas – 2, Miss Whisky – 1 and Alex – 0 (due to her overall Frenchness she’s unable to do an Irish accent which admittedly puts her in a great position here…). I’ve actually just noticed that I wrote ‘craic’ above. That’d mean Lucas – 3. /sigh/
Saturday 6:45pm
Dinner time. We’re at Damson Diner. The food is great but the key thing for us is that the barman is seriously switched on. This mean whiskey sour uses Jameson infused with fresh ginger and lime for 3 months. While a little too much on its own, the infusion makes a perfect base for this signature cocktail. Also tasted gin infused with damsons which was seriously good.
Sunday 2:25am
We heart Dublin
Sunday 8:03am
Right. No hangover chat in these parts which is a major result given that last night we took no prisoners and left no stone unturned on our quest to drink the town dry of Jameson (in a responsible manner of course, no funny business here). Red Breast, Green Spot, Yellow Spot and Powers John’s Lane were also sampled, that goes without saying. We were taken on a tour of Dublin’s fine establishments ranging from homely hip places to plush VIP areas in clubs. It’s not an easy gig but somebody has to do it, right? But it’s light out now and after catching a few hours of sleep we need to be going back to the world of the living, ever so slowly and without sudden moves to be sure, as another busy day lies ahead. Today will be a bit more about whiskey, we think, as tastings are scheduled, so tune in for liquid chat/news/notes.
Also a very quick update on the Irish Credit Crunch Box – We are now officially bankrupt. Horrible fake Irish accents were put on and savage craic was had before we hit the scratcher. Will we carry on with our no-irishness-promise? Haven’t a baldy notion to be honest. We’ll stall the ball until breakfast at least, too banjaxed to think about this right now.
And lastly, Miss Whisky deserves a mention and a link at this point in out recognition of her overall performance last night. She may be only wee but that girl can handle her whiskey. Hats off.
Sunday 9:20am
Recovery position.
Sunday 10:11am
It’s bucketing down in Dublin today and we’re stalling at the hotel. A few tired faces around but we’ll get there.
Off topic, the WordPress app for iPhone is really shit.
Sunday 1:21pm
Too much?
Sunday 1:29pm
And an angry one. Btw, this is just a pit-stop on route to the Old Jameson Distillery. And yes, those are green pints. We’re making no apologies. We live lives on the edge. We’re the life takers and heart breakers. We are here, we don’t really know what’s going on but we love everybody.
Sunday 2:05pm
We’ve arrived. Any Gaelic speakers? Could you kindly translate?
Sunday 2:08pm
This can’t be right… Or can it?
Sunday 2:25pm
About to start the tasting. On a side note, we have this thing going on, we’re taking pictures that could be album covers for our fantasy band (we’d play a cross between folk, power ballads and gangster rap). So here’s one. What do you think?
Sunday 2:49pm
Going through the range with distiller Liam Donegan. The geekery levels are instantly through the roof. We’re having Jameson Original, Jameson Select Reserve, Jameson Gold Reserve and Jameson Rarest Vintage Reserve.
Sunday 3:56pm
And here’s the range in its full glory. Sorry to say bye to Liam but he needs to go back to be with his family on Sunday (understandable). In the way of consolation we’re about to be given cheese. Yes, cheese.
Sunday 4:12pm
Ok. We’re at Mulligan Grocer and this is what has been laid out. We love these people. Matching single pot still whiskeys with cheese? Don’t mind if we do. These guys do excellent work here and the place comes highly recommended.
Sunday 4:26pm
Enjoying a Galway Hooker. If a place has an extensive whiskey list, cheese + whiskey sets, craft beer AND sprays whiskey in the air to replicate the dunnage warehouse smell, such place, our dear friends, becomes dear to us. Funny how that happens. So many people we meet in Ireland, so many places we visit here, leave a mark and actually mean a lot to us. This is not drunk blogging, this is the truth. Ireland and Irish whiskey are among our favouritest things in the whole wide world. We love it here.
Sunday 6:35pm
More gourmet porn. This is potted crab accompanied by Black Rock Irish Stout from Dungarvan and Red Breast 12.
Once again, big up to Michael and the team at Mulligan Grocer. We are seriously considering not going back home tomorrow because of you.
Our Paddies Day is now in top gear and so do forgive us if the updates become somewhat more sporadic. Wi-fi is an issue in some places, as is the alcohol in the bloodstream. But we’ll try to be good. If you’re enjoying this, you may want to check out our twitter too, that’s managed by Graeme.
Anyway, back to the hotel now for all things green and soon we’re heading to the Jameson Live concert – the actual reason for us being here. Also, we’ll be picking the caption competition winner shortly, last chance to enter!
Monday 8:56am
The incredibly stupid iPhone app for WordPress decided to remove all content from this post last night. Most of it we were able to restore but some pictures and words from last night there is no trace of. Half a kingdom and Tiger’s hand in marriage for a decent WP app!
So we’re raging about this but will not give up. After brekkie we’ll upload pictures from last night again so keep checking back.
Last night was savage btw. We’ve tweeted this already but it’s so wicked to see whiskey as a product from a completely different perspective – that of a facilitator and lubricant of the coolest event of the coolest night of the year, rather than the centre of attention. It’s easy to get bogged down in the single malt geekery and lose sight of why exactly blends outsell malts 9-1.
Wrap up
As you can see that last update didn’t happen. Two intense days and nights in Dublin caught up with us on Monday and the journey back is a bit of a blur. But we will report on the Sunday late night events shortly and in a separate post.
On a more technical note, doing a live blog like this involves a lot of playing with your phone while other people are eating/drinking/talking/singing/dancing/sleeping, and it would be great to have some feedback – should we do this from other press trips with whisky companies too? We know from Analytics that you have been following this but you’ve been awfully quiet.
And finally, thanks a million to the team at Jameson, especially Jayne, Martin and Liam. And of course Alex and Miss Whisky, our trusty companions!We love you and you know it.
Out.
