Vegan Friendly Irish Craft Beer

Well Diageo has finally bowed to pressure from the vegan/vegetarian community and has declared that the pride of St James gate will be vegan friendly. With the removal of isinglass, a product derived from the swim bladders of fish and is expected to happen sometime around mid-2016. Isinglass is a fining agent that clarifies the beer. Where it's positively charge and binds the negatively charged yeast and which then falls out of solution, leaving a clear beer. There has been plenty of debate over the years of whether its use is needed in modern brewing. But probably its biggest use of isinglass still is within the cask conditioned ale of England. Obviously since it’s an animal product this has raised objections from vegan/vegetarians. But there has been a counter movement over that last few years with “Unfined beer", where Moor Beer has been leading the charge in the UK. 

"We are at the beginning of the project to install the new system. It’s a complex project and will take many months to install and test before it goes live and is used I the production of Guinness.” A company spokeswoman said via The Journal.ie 

But as ever, it’s the Irish craft beer sector that has been quietly been leading the charge for the last few years. A number of breweries have confirmed that their beers are Vegan friendly. The list below I would not be surprised to see grow over the next few years. 

St.Mel's Brewing Company

DungarvanBrewing Company 

Western Herd

Simon Lambert & Sons 

RyeRiver (McGargles, Grafters, Solas, Crafty)  

O Brother Brewing

Galway Bay Brewery*

So all is not is not lost, vegans can enjoy an Irish craft beer in many places around Ireland while supporting small indigenous independent breweries. Now that’s something worth raising a pint to. *Exception Buried at Sea which contains lactose.

Meet The Brewers 2: The fog or smoke of War

One beer I left out of the last blog post complete by accident was St Mels Spring bock. Its very unusual to see a bock been brewed on these shores,  but a very welcome  one. Weigh-in at 5.6% ABV, on the light end for a bock. But making it a more sessional beer than some of it tutionic brethren. A dark gold in colour, with a clean finish in short a very tasty lager. But the hook for me was the following smoky flavour, something that's push this beer into the must try range. A beer that is reminisce of some of the great German rauch beers and one that I hope is brewed long enough till the first BBQ of the season can be lit. Liam the brewer said there was no smoked malt used, but you have to admire the brewing alchemy that can coaxes such flavours from the yeast.  One definitely to look out for. 

Picture via St Mels FB page