It's not my purpose to piss anyone off this soon after posting. But I may have no choice when I post about the much revered KC Irish Fest. First of all, I will be there. I love the Irish Fest. Always have. Always will.
BUT... When will the mighty grip of the event's beer distributors be lifted for the sake of the visitors. More specifically, will the Irish Fest have any Irish Beer. I'm not picky. Smithwick's will do. Or what about some tasy Harp? I looked on the web site for the event and they don't mention specific brews that will be served.
In years past, Coors Light and Boulevard Wheat were about it. There is no question that the now defunct... I mean suspended KC Oktoberfest boasted the best selection of authentic brews. You could even get a fancy boot to imbibe from. But the Irish Fest remains beholden to certain distributors that unfortunately don't include fine Irish beers.
I hope I'm wrong. I'll gladly post a delightful blurb next Tuesday detailing how very wrong I was. In this case I honestly hope I'm wrong. Please... can we have an Irish beer at an Irish Fest?
4 comments:
You are NOT wrong. I think all the Irish in America will be dead before they serve Irish beer at Irish Fest. George threw a fit last year cause he couldn't get a Guinness.
You are wrong actually, on a couple points. One, Coors Light and Blvd. Wheat were never "it" at Irish Fest. We've always served Blvd. Stout and Pale Ale. And the complete beverage list was on the website, right here: http://kcirishfest.blogspot.com/2009/08/spirits.html
Two, there is no "mighty grip" of the event's beer distributors on Irish Fest. Central States Beverage, which distributes among other things Guinness and Harp is one of the beer distributors who sponsor Irish Fest. The simple reason that Boulevard is Irish Fest's primary product is because of a great Irish trait: loyalty. Boulevard has been with and helped build Irish Fest-and every other Irish event in Kansas City, for that matter-since day one. And the Kansas City Irish Fest isn't alone. None of the top three Irish Fests in America serve a drop of Guinness, including the Milwaukee Irish Fest, the biggest in the world.
There are arguments to be made regarding the "Irishness" of British-owned Guinness, Harp and Smithwick's but we won't get into that.
Response to Anony: I appreciate the loyalty sentiment as a response for why the beer selection is so poor at the Irish Fest.
I did drink Pale Ale the whole weekend there. They also had a irish cream liquor for sale as well. I wish I could have tried it, but it ran out by 1pm on Saturday (I guess Gomer's was too far to go to get more bottles).
I also had the Stout on Saturday. Thankfully I tried it on Saturday because it too ran out early on Sunday. Even though I could kinda of spy the brewery in the distance no reinforcements ever came that I saw.
Also I don't want to go out of my way to discuss the Guinness debate about what other festivals serve, but certainly other Irish Festivals of note serve other beers (check out these upcoming Irish Fests: Indy Irish Festival - Guinness, Harp, Smithwick's, Killians, etc; Irish Festival at the Jersey Shore - Harp and Guinness).
Also, Milwaukee has among other things, a Jameson Irish Whiskey tent with Irish whiskey for sale.
And by the way, the argument that others don't have Irish beer so it's no big deal that we don't is pretty weak. We should strive to have the best, most comprehensive Irish fest around.
Finally, I should also add that Boulevard has 7 beers available on tap at any time. Two were served the whole weekend with a third making a brief appearance.
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