Category: Four Provinces

2014, 8 Degrees Brewing, Beer Festival, Bo Bristle, Bru, Collective, Craft Beer, Dan Kelly's, Four Provinces, http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008/kind#post, Jack Cody's, Kentucky Ale, McGargles, Meath, Navan, Smyth's Bar, Vanguard Beer

The First #Snobfest Event – Smyth’s Beer Garden Festival Sat 27th September

by irishbeersnobLeave a Comment on The First #Snobfest Event – Smyth’s Beer Garden Festival Sat 27th September

So this past saturday was the 1st Smyth’s Beer Garden Festival. It was many firsts, the First Beer Festival that Smyth’s on The Square in Navan had hosted. Despite having one of the broadest ranges of craft beers in the county. More importantly it was also the first event i’ve organised from conception to inception to delivery. Nerve wracking stuff.

With a great venue in the back, a lovely beer garden, well sheltered, we had the perfect space for plenty of vendors, and plenty of punters. The only thing we could pray on was the rain staying way and thank fully it did. On the day itself we had a local feel to it with many coming from not to far away. 

We’d barbecue food, and local musicians playing music all day, it all added to a great atmosphere for everyone who was there.


We had local favourites Brú Brewery who were there with their bottle beers, and excitingly a keg of their new flagship beer Brú, a pale ale thats very well made, but also very accessible and will attract no doubt a lot of your typical heineken drinkers. I loved the fact they served the 30l keg using a party pump. If that isn’t craft I don’t know what is.

Picture taken from BruBrewery.ie

Next up locally we had from Drogheda, we had newcomers Jack Cody’s – who came with their Amber Ale “Smiggy” and Pilsner “Puck” in bottles, and always the beer was a cracker, it’s a very steady seller in Smyth’s and was good to see Geoff again talking to people about his great beers. 


Also from Drogheda we’d the delectible Dan Kelly’s Cider, Olan brought their two varieties, the Fiona’s Fancy which is my favourite, and their normal Dan Kelly’s cider. Thanks for coming Olan and bringing your lovely cider.

From Kentucky USA via Dunboyne Co Meath we had Kentucky Ale with their range of beers, and also their stand out Town Branch Bourbon, and Pearse Lyons Reserve Single Malt – these guys also proved very popular.


Continuing the trend for Irish Beers, James Winans came down from Vanguard Beer Collective, the only distributor out there who only distributes Irish Craft Beer, he carries a great range of bottles and kegs, and on the day that was in it, he brought two from 8 Degrees Brewing their Howling Gale Ale, and Knockmealdown Porter, and the topical Four Provinces The Hurler. My FIL was very impressed with the Knockmealdown Porter, and as always James was fantastic.


Next up we’d from Clane, Kelly’s Mountain Brew with their Justice Pale Ale, both in bottle form and draught. The Justice is a really well made pale ale, very accessible and was pouring lovely.

Ronan and Jacqui were great, even Jacqui ended up serenading the crowd when the musicians had finished for the evening. Great craic altogether. 



The fantastic Bo Bristle Double IPA had just been tapped!

Young Dave Guilfoyle from Bo Bristle was there also, bringing the beer from Offaly, more specifically Banagher. We had some of their amber and IPA in bottles, but on draught as the day went on, they rotated through their range. Starting with their punchy refreshing Pilsner, moving up to their fruity and citrussy IPA, up next was its big brother the Double IPA, and then finally the imperial Red, which was great. Thank you Dave for bringing these two festival special beers.  Even if you did have to chase me away from the taps!

I couldn’t find a glass! Don’t judge me!!!




Last but not least we also had McGargles from Kilcock there who were pouring three of their range, the lovely Cousin Rosies Pale Ale, Granny Mary’s Red, and Knock Knock Ned IPA, as always their bar stood out with those distinctive taps and tankards! 

Thank you to all you brewers who attended, and hopefully we’ll see you at another #BeerSnobFest in the future. If you are a publican and are looking to do something on a small scale like this, get in touch and we’ll see what we can put together.

Overall we have received very positive feedback from people who were there, including brewers, the owner of the premises, and most importantly the customers who gave their €10 for their entry. To be clear the €10 entry included, your entry, your food, and 2 beer tokens. The entry fee also covered the fact there was 4 musical acts entertaining you all day. Above all else we wanted to give value for money.

There has been one of two comments re the cost, we took the decision to drop the entry fee to €5 after 9pm which at that stage we had actually stopped serving food. This reduced rate still included your 2 beer tokens. One comment I read stated food had stopped at 8 pm, this was not the case. As always i’d prefer to have been made aware of this at the time so at the least we could have attempted to correct it, it was disappointing to read this after the event when there is no way to fix it up, but most importantly it’s not constructive criticism.  

Have we learnt anything doing this? Of course, we’ve learned heaps on what to do next time, and more importantly what not to do. I always endeavour to write this blog in a fair and balanced manner and if i do have issues I will communicate these promptly and directly in private to allow for a discussion. 

Lastly, i’d also like to thank Kieran Tuke a friend of mine who was snapping photos all day, you can follow him on Twitter @tukekieran.



Anyway, here are some of the links to the thoughts of some of the bloggers who were at the event also.

Simon Says You Should Drink this Blog Review
11pm Somewhere Dedicates an Episode to the festival
The Thoughts of Corrigan Says Blog
Bru Brewery even had a mention!

Here’re some Verbatims taken from around the place;

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2014, Beer Ireland, EBBC14, Four Provinces, Franciscan Well, http://schemas.google.com/blogger/2008/kind#post, Premier Beers, The Church, Ugly Duckling Dublin

And now the conclusion – EBBC Day 2 – Thoughts

by irishbeersnob2 Comments on And now the conclusion – EBBC Day 2 – Thoughts

So this is following on from my previous posts re the European Beer Bloggers Conference, this one will cover the final day.

Day 2 was an early start, 10am was the first event. Dean McGuinness of Premier Beers was giving the talk and the state of the Irish Craft Beer sector. Knowing this was going to be a long day pre conference grub and fuel was provided by Ugly Duckling – Cheers Darragh for the awesome full irish! Just what was needed.

Dean talked us through his 10 Commandments and they made a lot of sense, but the Honesty one was the one that resonated. Just tell people whats in their beer. 



It was a bit odd that when the subject being discussed was the Irish Beer Scene that we were sampling a couple of UK Beers, and a German Bock. I know this caused conversation to the side. Personally though it reflects the small amount of Dean’s portfolio that is actually Irish. Most of it is foreign. The beers themselves were tasty, even if we did peer pressure Simon into joining us at that time.

Next up was the meat and potatoes, Supercharging you’re Blog. This was the main reason I came. As a new blogger I wanted to learn some tips to improve my blog, and ultimately increase readership. Cindy from Zephyr tours gave the talk and it was fascinating to learn about the different things. A lot of these I will be implementing over the coming months.

So it was break time, and once again Pilsner Urquell provided the generous hospitality of lunch, we had the awesome Church staff cook up a great barbecue with more unfiltered Pilsner. I got to tap the keg myself, and so did Rossa. The quality checking was very important!

Quality check of the pour with Vaclav Berka

The generosity didn’t stop there, they had packs of can’s for us to take with us too. I was lucky enough that the marketing people let me take home an extra pack for a twitter raffle with a branded Pilsner Urquell glass. My only regret, I didn’t get a glass for myself! 

//platform.twitter.com/widgets.jsAfter lunch we then had the guys from WordPress talking about their blog platform. I must say I was really impressed with the tips they also gave and they were extremely helpful, a migration to wordpress could be on the cards later in the year. We also had a fascinating chat with Tomasz from Poland who has frankly insane numbers of views for youtube. His main hint – don’t edit your videos, just get them up! Once these were done and dusted we had a beer reception from Beer Ireland showcasing yet again the great craft brews in this country. The Hurler by Four Provinces was the perfect beer for the clammy conditions in the Church. 

Approaching the end of the events was a dinner sponsored by Franciscan Well, allowing our host venue to highlight again the quality of their food, with Irish produced matched to the Fran Well beers. My favourite beer of the night was the Jameson Barrel aged Stout, simply amazing. But the highlight was Shane Long’s talk, Shane is the Head Brewer and it was great to hear his passionate speech where he covered the move from independent brewer to being in the Molson Coors family. Shane is a massive influence in the Irish market and provides advice, help, and his time to brewers all over the country. I for one hope they heed his plea to break from the norm of pale ale, red, and stout. But the night wasn’t over yet. We had a final event of entertainment and beers from O’Haras. We got to try all of their core beers, but we also got to suggest a beer for them to make. I suggested a Gooseberry sour, but wouldn’t be hopeful it will be picked.

All in all this was a fantastic weekend, and I am grateful to the sponsors for stepping in to make sure this went ahead. A big thank you to Zephyr for organising this, and I can’t wait to see where it is in 2015.