Online Discussion on 12 November 2023 with Poitin Now founder Francis Leavey, tasting through the limited edition poitins released at the 2022 Poitin Now festival!
Drammers Club was proud to attend the 1st annual Poitin Now festival in Dublin! Our club will be hosting an upcoming virtual Poitin Now festival for our members in the United States soon. In the meantime, we recorded some of the speeches and presentations for those who missed the festival
Festival founder Francis Leavey welcomes the crowd to the festival…
The doors opened at Noon and the event, which was sold out, was packed to the brim…
Here is the presentation on the history of poitin from Irish Whiskey historian and author Fionnan O’Connor:
Next up was a panel discussion by leading poitin producers and advocates:
Dave Mulligan (owner of Ban Poitin and Bar 1661 — where the festival was held and which was just named best bar in Ireland.
Brendan Carty - Founder and Master Distiller at Killowen Distillery.
Padraic O Griallais - Founder and Master Distiller at Micil Distillery.
Closing Statement by Festival Organizer Francis Leavey (First Session):
The attendees hustled to try all of the poitin samples on offer from the attending producers, which included: Baoilleach Distillery, Blackwater Distillery, Intrepid Spirits, Mourne Dew Distillery, Ban Poitin, Killowen Distillery, Micil Irish Poitin, Two Stacks, Smuggling Nun, Tipperary Distillery, Off the Cuffe Irish Bitters and Beara Bitters.
Additional Videos from the 2nd Session:
The festival took place in two sessions (Noon to 2pm and 2:15 to 4:15pm), and they repeated the presentations from Fionnan O’Connor and the panel discussion in the second session. If you’re a completist (like many of us here at Drammers Club) you will likely enjoy watching these as well — some of what they discussed was covered in the first session, but they also touched on new things in the second versions of the presentations..
2nd Panel Discusion:
(Same panelists as the first session, noted above).