On a side note, they have ruined The Curragower with the recent developments imo. It always branded itself as a gastropub which could "transform" to a proper pub at the weekend on the terrace. It's completely lost that charm now though and is just another wannabe upmarket eatery for insta huns. Disappointing to say the least.
JJs all the way baby
Underdog opening Tuesday 20th.
Did anyone go? Much changed inside?
It's in a brand new location, so it's completely different to the last two places. Standard Underdog opening night sweatbox. It'll be interesting to see how it changes over time, especially when they start doing food.
They're gonna start doing food? Pity. I kinda prefer my bars to be gargle-only but nowadays it's such a rarity.
Actually one of the things I liked best about Underdog but such is life.
Yeah but if it helps keeps them in business I am all for it.
That spot at the top of Capel street seems to be a real challenge for businesses to prevail.
Hopefully Underdog can make a go of it.
newish large stay city hotel by Smithfield market plus the new large hotel opening next to the Hacienda should give them a good stream of 5 minute walk tourist beer hunters also. If they advertise in those local hotels.
Very full last night, it didn't start thinning out until after 10. Bumped into lots of people I knew. Usual great selection of beer (unless you wanted a clear/west coast IPA!) Really hope they can break the hoodoo on that particular location, but if anyone can do it, Paddy can.
Yeah, I went in for a couple of hours, echo what everyone else said really, excellent selection as per, and solid regular taps too.
The Lapsang Souchong Lambic was one of the most challenging beers I've ever drank, really interesting, and just like a Rauchbier, once you got over the smokey notes it settled down to the base beer coming through.
Just about the comment on the heat in the place, I never remember that location being like that before, so it was surely just a function of the weather.
That doesn't sound like a great selection, at all.
Seems to be the standard now. Bullhouse and Boundary taprooms are both local to me and stock plenty of IPAs. On my last visit, between the 2 of them, there was 1 non-hazy on the boards (a 3.8% session).
Was in the Porterhouse on Parliament St. the other day.
Some of the draught beers on the menu were shown as "16oz" with no metric equivalent, that means zip to me and pretty much everyone else except American tourists.
Is this legal?
Bad form in any case.
We're the beers available in pint or 16oz or was it just 16oz ?
Not sure about legal and would imagine it's fine as long as they have the correct glassware ( I doubt there is 16oz stamped glasses so could be an issue there )
It's pretty douchy though and if they are not also selling that beer in pints then it's a sneaky way to up the price without upping the price.
Only offered as 16oz. I didn't order one so don't know about the glassware but if it said "16oz" on the side I still wouldn't know what I was really getting without looking it up. It's a meaningless unit for almost everyone.
AFAIK the only non-metric drinks measures which are allowed are draught beer and cider in pint and half pint and anything else must be stated in mL. Would be nice if someone could confirm if this is correct.
Most of the draught stuff was pints but we all know what a pint is! La Chouffe on draught was 330mL (had one too, nice glass!)
All of the bottled beers had mL quantity stated as far as I could see.
They explicitly stated that a spirit measure was 35.5mL, fair enough.
Porterhouse has gone seriously downhill over the last few years I'm afraid but still a decent spot if you want food on the way to going somewhere else.
We often offer beer as 2/3 of a pint but they are 330ml glassware.
I have served 1/3 and 2/3 pint but couldn't tell you if it's legal or not.
16oz to me seems like when a chocolate bar gets smaller rather than up the price. Someone will order an IPA and get a sort of pint looking thing at a reasonable price for an actual pint.
That's an odd choice. 16oz is a US pint. So, if someone asks for a pint of beer, they do get a pint - just an American pint as opposed to imperial.
Now that would definitely be illegal if the person says "pint". But ya Ide say they hope people will just say 1 beer please and not notice. Many people order a pint without say the "pint" bit.
It's illegal, AFAIK. The "pint" referred to is an Imperial pint - 568ml, which is 20 fluid ounces, not 16. And some of that 16 will be foam. Would there be any enforcement? Probably not?
Another part of the 'downsizing'/price inflation that's been going on lately; loads of craft beers stopped coming in 500ml bottles/cans over the last few years, too, and is now only in 440ml or 330ml.
Agree with your last paragraph. I was in Tapped recently and didn't enjoy it all. For all the "51 Taps" marketing, I didn't really feel the variety of beers was all that great.
The selection was excellent: there were two nitro stouts, at least two imperial stouts, an amber ale, a red ale, a lambic sour, a Helles, a... actually, you can see the list here: https://taplist.io/underdog
That's all on draught. They also had a decent selection of cans/bottles. The only thing missing as far as I was concerned was a sessionable (5% or less) west coast IPA on draught. I ended up switching to having a couple of cans of an American IPA which was decent but a little too strong for me.
Well then you're not actually giving people what you say you are, 2/3 of a pint is 378mL...
I would have no problem with places offering whatever oddball size beer they want provided it's clearly stated in mL what it is.
They're not getting what Irish law understands to be a pint or what the customer understands to be a pint.
The Porterhouse has done this for years, there's nothing "lately" about it. But yes, it's completely illegal. They can serve beer by the 473ml glass, but they can't advertise it as "16oz".
Enforcement of consumer laws for things like this is abysmal in Ireland generally. Barely an imported can is legal.
I don't consider a selection that lacks a basic craft beer style excellent, at all.
IPAs were the original craft beer style. To me, not having a west coast IPA (remember when they were just called IPAs?) is akin to not having any stout or lager on tap.
Just had a look there. What an excellent selection.
So craft beer is around so long now you have people complaining there is no "normal beers" on tap 🤣
So it seems 😉
I mourn for IPA as I know it. Probably an age thing!
The bottles and cans have to explicitly state what you're getting though, and in a meaningful unit rather than a very obscure obsolete one.
It'd be like selling spirits as 1/5 gill to try to hide the fact that a standard measure, 35.5mL, is 1/4 gill. It seems the amount of short-changing is pretty much exactly the same!
I had a birthday in The Black Sheep a few years ago that turned out to also be the launch night for Althea. Quite enjoyed it at the time. I didn't realise then it was the start of a slippery slope!
