March 2022 | THE LAKER | Page 3
St. Patrick’s Day Celebrations By Dawn Bradbury Here’s your March 17 forecast: A flurry of Irish stew and boiled dinners, with Guinness heavily flowing at the area’s Irish-themed pubs. Yes, there also will be green beer and fish and chips, Irish music and the wearing of the green … lots of it. This year could be the closest to normal St. Patrick’s Day in two years. “It will be a really fun, festive atmosphere, with staff and customers, Irish music in the background … it’s going to be just what we need,” said Megan Page, general manager at Patrick’s Pub & Eatery in Gilford. The COVID-19 pandemic exploded on the scene right around St. Patrick’s Day in 2020, changing not only that holiday but daily life for the next two years. While cases are dropping, the pandemic is by no means over, but between vaccinations and. booster shots, this is the closest things have come to returning to normal. Irish-themed pubs around the area will be rolling out live entertainment and Guinness will flow. Many local breweries are brewing up special beers for the holiday: Moat Mountain Smokehouse & Brewing Company in North Conway and Twin Barns Brewing Company in Meredith. At Patrick’s, 18 Weirs Road in Gil-
ford, owned by Jeff and Allan Beetle, the day will get started a little earlier than usual: The pub opens at noon instead of its usual 4 p.m. Dinner will be served until 8 p.m., while the bar will remain open a little later for revelers. Live entertainment starts at noon with The O’Brien Clan Trio, and Matt Langley takes the stage from 4-7 p.m. “It’s very, very festive,” Page said. “Our staff really gets into it; they go all out with their outfits. We have some regulars who come in every St. Paddy’s, and they count down the days.” In addition to the music, there will of course be food: a traditional boiled dinner with housemade corned beef, bangers and mash featuring local Irish sausage from Claremont’s North Country Smokehouse, and soda bread made locally by Phyllis Shoemaker. “We’ll also have our traditional Irish sticky toffee pudding,” Page
said. “The recipe came directly from Ireland on a trip Allan and his wife, Jennifer, took.” The regular menu includes some nontraditional Irish food as well — shepherd’s pie made with beef instead of lamb; a Reuben sandwich featuring the housemade corned beef and “Irish nachos,” as well as the popular Drunken Leprechaun fried chicken dish, served with housemade whiskey barbecue sauce. Patrons won’t go thirsty: Representatives from Baileys will be on hand to promote the new Baileys Deliciously Light Irish cream. Patrick’s staff will pour green beer all day, along with an Irish red ale, Slainte, brewed by Moat Mountain Smokehouse & Brewing in North Conway. There’s an Irish twist on an old-fashioned (made with Irish whiskey) and Irish coffee. And of course, there will be Guinness.
“We pride ourselves on pouring the perfect pint,” Page said, adding that their bartenders have received training from Guinness on this very subject. Page expects this year to be a far cry from March 2020, when the country shut down right before St. Patrick’s Day because of the COVID-19 pandemic. “We had already prepared everything for our boiled dinners and on our big day, we had quite the takeout crowd, it was awesome,” Page remembers. They were able to pivot immediately because they already had a thriving takeout business. Now, takeout has grown so much they have a dedicated takeout person daily, sometimes two. Patrick’s, which opened in 1987, is named after the original owner’s (Walter Kelleher) father from Macroom, County Cork, Ireland. Patrick’s was purchased from Walter Kelleher in 1994 by Jeff and Allan Beetle. No reservations will be taken; it will be first-come, first-served with a steady stream of customers expected. Prime time will be 5-6 p.m. as people are getting out of work, Page said. In Wolfeboro, the celebration has already started at Morrisseys’ Porch & Pub, 286 S. Main Street. The pub had “perfect pint training” from Guinness earlier this month so staff is ready to • St. Patrick’s Day Continued on page 4
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