Whiskey tasting in Ireland - West, South-West
 

We were watching a travel show today, and they showed a whiskey tasting at a distillery in Northern Ireland. We will not get to Northern Ireland, so can you please tell me, is there anything similar in any of these places (or surroundings): Clidfen, Dingle, Kenmare, Cashel, Bunratty?
We are going in August.
Thanks a lot.

there will not be breweries everywhere. try the one in Middleton and I think I know lockes. Remember there are lots of whiskey's sold as Irish outside ireland but many are not sold here. Not sure why or is it just made for tourists and outsiders :-) There is a Jameson tour in Dublin in smithfield but they do not distill here its more a museum with a pub and tasting at the end.

The Lockes Distillery in Kilbeggan does not distill there any more. All of there work is in the Cooley distillery. As Siobhan say, Middleton is the big one. The bulk of Irish whiskey is distilled by the same organization, the Irish Distillers group in Middleton. They are a bit east of Cork City. Cooley, north of Dublin is the only independent I know of. Despite the name, Connemara is distilled at Cooley and the malt is "peated" in Scotland.

There is a micro brewery (if that interests you) west of Ennis in the little village of Inagh. They put out some good beers and it's a nice break from the usual.

Bill

Thank you all – this really comes as a big surprise, I expected whiskey distilleries to be everywhere in Ireland.

I guess we’ll skip the distillery tour (and the tasting) this time. It’s not high on the list of things we would like to do in Ireland, so there is no need to sacrifice other things for it. Would’ve been nice, interesting and different – we might check the microbrewery West of Ennis, though. Wojazz, do you know more details on name and location? Thanks

The porter house in Dublin has 3 locations and microbrew their beer and offer other unusual ones as well from other countries. There is a microbrewery in Smithfield and I think they sell to shops and do private events.

The Biddy Early brewery (http://www.beb.ie/) is in tiny little Inagh which is on the N85 between Ennis and Ennistimon. If you blink, you'll miss the town. It's on the southeast corner of the intersection with the R46o which goes to Corofin and Miltown Malbay. Grab a pint there. They have a little video on the brewery and the legend of Biddy Early. It's a nice little pub.

You won't be in Dublin (I just scribbled all over your itinerary post) but Siobhan's suggestions are good there too. Also, Mssr. MaGuries puts out some fine beers. The Dublin Brewing company in Smithfield I belive is still producing beer and it would be served at the Cobblestone. There is a Kinsale Brewery (which was closed both times I tried in Feb and a Carlow brewery. Cork City has the Franciscan Well brewery. Those are all of the micros I know of in Ireland. This seems to suggest that I drink to much beer.

Bill

Locke`s Distillery started distilling whiskey again in March 2007.

Wow, I didn't realize that Sandylan. There was absolutely no mention of that in June of 2006 and it certainly didn't seem to be close to an operational standard at that point.

I actually thought you had to be crazy until I found it on the internet from the Athlone Advertiser:

http://www.athloneadvertiser.ie/index.php?aid=4077

Thanks for the news!

Bill