10 best Irish beers you just have to try this St Patrick’s Day

Best: Overall

Rating: 10/10

• Style: IPA
• Strength: 6%

Country Cork’s Eight Degrees Brewing have been in business since 2011 and produce an impressive range of pale ales, but it’s their IPA full Irish that we keep returning to. It’s created to showcase the local barley which gives it a full, biscuity body with a hint of sweetness, while a quartet of hops – amarillo, cascade, citra and simcoe – ram it full of fruity grapefruit and lime flavours with resinous pine and a dry, herbal bitterness.

Best: Irish stout

Rating: 9/10

• Style: Irish stout
• Strength: 4.3%

Of all the excellent Irish stouts available, we’ve always had a liking for O’Haras, made by the Carlow Brewing Company since 1996. They’ve recently improved on the home drinking experience by producing this nitro version, using widget technology to inject nitrogen into the beer and create a pub-style pour with a thick, creamy head. From the coffee-tinged aroma to the sweet and toasty malt flavours, and a moreish dry, bitter finish, this ticks all the Irish stout boxes, with the added bonus of that hand-pulled effect.

Best: Irish ale

Rating: 7/10

• Style: Red ale
• Strength: 3.8%

Smithwick’s Brewery first started producing beer over three centuries ago, and this Irish ale is very much produced for traditional tastes. It’s an amber-coloured brew but has a definite ruddy glow to it which gives it the “red ale” style name. The malty, grainy backbone has a sweet caramel character and it dries towards the finish with some subtle hop bitterness. It’s only 3.8 per cent and is easy to drink, but as you sip the flavour builds and, before you know it, you’re already pouring out your second.

Best: Irish lager

Rating: 8/10

• Style: Helles lager
• Strength: 5%

Slow lives is a German-style helles lager produced by the excellent Galway Bay Brewery on Ireland’s west coast. It has a lovely sweet, bready malt body that fills the mouth with flavour, while the prickly carbonation helps to create the kind of crisp and refreshing feeling you want from a lager. And by the time the subtly spicy Saaz hops emerge at the finish, your tastebuds will be transported from the peace and quiet of Galway Bay to the boozy beer halls of Munich.

Best: Irish craft beer

Rating: 9/10

• Style: APA
• Strength: 4.5%

Dublin’s Whiplash Brewery is the hottest property in Ireland’s craft beer scene, and with good reason – its beers are loaded with modern flavours and are expertly produced in small batches. Body riddle is a standout brew along the lines of an American Pale Ale. Beneath a frothy white head is a very pale and hazy liquid that’s brim full of tropical and lemon fruit flavours and a pine and pithy citrus bitterness. It’s bright and breezy enough to knock back as a thirst quencher but has enough complexity to sip and savour. Delicious.

Best: Irish pale ale

Rating: 9/10

• Style: Pale ale
• Strength: 5.0%

The Heaney brewery was founded by relatives of the legendary Irish poet Seamus Heaney and brews its beers on the family farm in Bellaghy, County Derry. Its core range features classic styles that follow traditional lines, but with just enough of a modern touch to appeal to a broad range of drinkers. The pale ale has a clean and simple malty base with subtle flavours of tangy orange and bitter pine lending it depth and complexity. It’s well crafted and a pleasure to drink from start to finish.

Best: Modern IPA

Rating: 7/10

• Style: IPA
• Strength: 5.5%

Belfast’s Boundary Brewing is a cooperative owned by its members that rattles out all manner of experimental beers. One of those experiments led to the discovery of mosaic and azacca as a winning hop combination, and you can taste the results in this densely hazy beer. Expect a tropical fruit medley, with mango and citrus among the full, juicy flavours that are all the rage in the trendiest IPAs, and an unobtrusive, tobacco-like bitterness at the finish.

Best: Strong beer

Rating: 8/10

• Style: Barrel-aged porter
• Strength: 8.8%

The Brehon Brewhouse operates from a converted outbuilding on a farm in Co Monaghan and the ingredients are all sourced locally, including the water which is drawn from a well on site. Among the range are limited-edition porters that have been aged in whiskey casks, with each bottling varying in strength. The beer is extremely dark and smooth to sip, with sweet coffee flavours up front, while you get a hint of the whisky and oak as some dark, bitter chocolate rounds things off. This is a delicious, grown-up porter.

Best: Sour ale

Rating: 7/10

• Style: Dry-hopped sour
• Strength: 3.5%

The White Hag produces some excellent sessionable ales that are full of flavour. If that sounds good, and you’re in the mood for a big hit of sour lemon, then take a punt on the puca. It’s just 3.5 per cent and as refreshing as a cold lemonade, but with the bonus of lemony hops and booze. It’s also very sour, courtesy of the brewery’s own cultivated wild yeast, which brings out those lemon flavours to the maximum.

Best: Alcohol-free beer

Rating: 7/10

• Style: Alcohol-free stout
• Strength: 0.0%

With the rise in popularity of alcohol-free beers, many big brands are now getting in on the act. Guinness 0.0 per cent is one of the more faithful recreations of a full-strength beer you can find, which is great news for stout drinkers who want to stay sober. It’s thick, creamy and shares the same toasty coffee and chocolate notes, but without the added meatiness that booze brings. One of the better 0 per cent beers around.