I’ve drunk Guinness all my life and I’ve never had a hangover or a beer belly

On St Patrick’s Day, our writer explains her lifelong love of the black stuff – not least for its gut health benefits

I credit my parents with my love of Guinness, now Britain’s top selling pint and consumed by one in nine beer drinkers. I am the third of a seven-child family and I remember my mum drinking a single GP-prescribed bottle of Guinness a day while pregnant with my younger siblings. “It’s for the iron,” she would say. “I don’t even like the taste.” I have no reason to disbelieve her as she never touched Guinness outside of doctor’s orders.
Years later the tale spread across the city – possibly apocryphal – that the brewery had mistaken their decimal points and the much lauded iron content of a Guinness pint was in fact only 0.3mg and not the 3mg promised to women in the family way. That means there’s as much iron in a single egg as there is in three pints of Guinness. (Amusingly, my mother was allergic to eggs.) At the same time, my father used to boast about the free pint of Guinness he’d be given in exchange for the pint of blood he regularly donated. On my graduation day in Dublin, he even took me on a tour of the award-winning Guinness Storehouse as part of our celebration.
Rhiannon Lambert, one of the UK’s leading nutritionists, highlights the possible benefits of choosing Guinness instead of alternative alcohol drinks: “Guinness contains antioxidants up to twice the amount of other beers, particularly flavonoids, associated with a reduced risk in chronic diseases such as cardiovascular and some cancers. There are nutritional benefits in most beers – including B vitamins, fibre and prebiotics that promote the growth of ‘good’ bacteria in your gut – and Guinness offers more of these. Since it contains unmalted barley, it is also one of the beers with the highest levels of fibre.”
The science appears to be reflected in today’s drinking trend for low or zero alcohol drinks. The viral images of Kim Kardashian sipping a pint on Paddy’s Day last year have assured the abundance of hashtags including #GuinnessGirls is here to stay. But it’s not just glamour by association. According to Lambert, conditions such as osteoporosis could possibly be counteracted with safe Guinness drinking: “A study conducted in 2009 found a positive connection between the silicon in stout and bone health. However, there are obviously healthier alternatives to obtain your broader range of nutrients such as vegetables, fruit and berries.”
Growing up in 1970s Dublin, where you could smell the pungent Guinness hops on a hot day, it’s not surprising that I’ve only ever drunk Ireland’s most famous export. With one television channel, it was hard to evade the brilliance of the brewery’s advertising. Even to my childish eyes, the mind-blowing budgets boasted cinema quality with movie stars (Rutger Hauer) and witty slogans. One called The Surfer was voted number one in Channel 4’s 2000 programme The 100 Greatest TV Ads and was directed by Jonathan Glazer whose film, The Zone of Interest, recently won the Oscar for Best International Feature Film.
At university in the 1980s, I chose the tipple that would most likely give me the nonchalant air I so desperately lacked. All the pretty girls and goth boys drank the black stuff, so it seemed my best step towards social acceptance. Like my mum, I didn’t much like the taste at first, but with sheeplike perseverance, I was soon converted and have never since countenanced another beer.
When I moved to London with the rest of my Ryanair generation, there ensued frenzied debates about where we could get “a decent pint” away from Guinness HQ. Cue scorching reviews from male mates decrying English barmen’s cluelessness at pouring a pint without the reverence we were accustomed to back home. It’s true that the ritual of waiting for your pint while it rested half poured was largely ignored back then in London but, in all honesty, I couldn’t taste the difference. I stuck to my stout while the men opted for the Dutch lagers that were trending at the time. When my sophisticated new English journalist friends started drinking espresso martinis, I referenced my creamy topped, dark lovely as their inspiration. The iconic creamy head is formed through a process of nitrogenation that combines nitrogen gas and carbon dioxide to give the beer its velvety texture.
It was around this time in my drinking history when I noticed the health benefits – the lager and cocktail drinkers seemed to reach peak drunkenness quicker than me and suffered bitterly with next day hangovers. Guinness is not a drink you bolt so my sobriety was envied and I’ve never had a hangover from it in my life. I was simply drinking a lower ABV (alcohol by volume) of just over 4 per cent while some lagers are as high as 6 per cent. Lower alcohol means fewer calories – 210 for Guinness compared to as high as 290 for stronger ales. While far from boasting a gym bunny-body, I remain beer-belly-free. Some even say that drinking Guinness is like a meal in itself. It can’t be called a meal nutritionally, of course, but it is certainly filling enough to discourage excess.
When my magazine editing job took me to the dizzy heights of the front row fashion circuit, I tired quickly of the endless champagne on offer and longed for the comfort of my trusted curvy pint of Irish champagne. I have a fond memory of playing hooky with my team during one Paris Fashion Week when we absconded to an excellent Guinness pub behind the Ritz Hotel to watch Andy Murray win the US Open. My fashion team was probably embarrassed by my “unfashionable” libation, but today’s trend proves I have had the last laugh. “Good things come to those who wait” (Guinness’s tagline throughout the 1990s) could have been my wedding slogan.
My husband and I got together later in life, took over 20 years to wed and cemented our relationship over a shared enjoyment of completing a crossword with our pints of plain. My favourite wedding picture is of me clutching a pint directly after the service while the photographer wondered if I’d chosen my complementary black and white dress on purpose. As if. The latest buzzy London pub, The Devonshire, has received many plaudits about its perfect pint of Guinness with the proprietor speaking of its celebrated slow-pour ritual in hushed tones. The normal ratio of 70:30 nitrogen to carbon dioxide, is split 82:18 in this pub, which brings the creamy head closer to any Dublin pint. It may all be style over substance, but after 40 years of imbibing, I’ll certainly be found sipping one of the 13 million pints pulled worldwide this St Patrick’s Day. Sláinte!
Recommended