Wish I Could Try – Luck of the Dragon from Guinness Open Gate

The Maryland outpost of Guinness has had some drinks that made me want to be on the East Coast and one such brew is Luck of the Dragon, brewed for Lunar New Year.  It is a “5.0% ABV ale is infused with dragon fruit powder and orange purée, giving it this stunning fuchsia color.”

If that wasn’t reason enough, sales of the lucky beer goes “to support the extraordinary artists at Baltimore’s Asian Pasifika Arts Collective, a nonprofit organization dedicated to using art to promote the representation of Asian Americans in everyday life and build connections across communities.”

Guinness is Old Fashioned

Guinness and their Open Gate brewery in Maryland have done quite a bit of experimenting, most of which stays on their taps. This holiday season though, an Old Fashioned cocktail beer will have a bigger distribution footprint.

I am a sucker for a cocktail beer and this is the perfect time for this particular cocktail.

Bubble Tea

Just when you think that brewers have stopped raiding other beverages, along comes the Maryland Guinness brewery with…

“In celebration of Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and in collaboration with Diageo’s PAN Asian Network, we’re brewing a Bubble Tea Inspired Stout. The iconic black tea, vanilla, brown sugar and tapioca flavors meet our base stout recipe in the first Baltimore-brewed can release that we’ve ever nitrogenated!

A $15,000 donation is being made to the incredible creatives at Baltimore’s Asian Pasifika Arts Collective as part of this collab project.”

It actually sounds kind of good to me.

Over the Moon

Guinness and their Open Gate Brewery in Maryland will finally be sending a beer across the US. And that beer is Over The Moon Milk Stout. The third recipe that the brewery brewed. It is a 5.3% ABV milk stout. is the brewery’s first nationally sold beer since opening to the public a little over a year ago.

This Wheat has a Brogue


I am glad that the venerable Guinness is “opening the gate” and doing beers outside the Stout zone. Which is why that I am glad to see the new Irish Wheat hit our shores.

Why? Because America seems to have the mantle of taking a classic style and American-izing it. So why can’t there be an Irish take on a hefe?

Here is what Guinness has to say about Irish Wheat:
It “is a clean, crisp refreshing tasting beer with notes of zesty citrus, subtle clove and banana. It is light, golden with a typical wheat haze.”

Sounds like a summer beer to me.

Guinness in Maryland


Apparently, the East Coast of the U.S. is where it’s at for brewery locations but this time, it is not a brewery from the west that is breaking ground but instead stoic (with hints of change) Guinness that is planting a “Coming Soon” flag.
The oddly named Relay, Maryland will be the site for a U.S. version of Dublin’s popular Guinness Open Gate Brewery, it will be a mid-sized brewery and visitor experience. Just without the huge facility and without any stout which will not be brewed stateside. The Maryland “facility will brew and feature beers created solely for the American market.”
I did not know this but it is a return to the U.S. for Guinness after 63 years.