Brigit's Bathtub (and other beer-related bits)

I love how much beer culture is becoming aware of our lady of the lake of ale. I  have written about beer (or ale) in this blog before. Check here for previous posts.

Amy Panetta clued me in to St. Brigid's Bathtub Pub, in Detroit, Michigan. According to the website Downtown Detroit Bars,

Bathtub Pub

If you look up the phrase "dive bar" in the dictionary, a photo of St. Brigid's Bathtub Pub with surely be in the margins of the page. That is in no way a bad thing, though. Located directly next to the famous American and Lafayette Coney Islands, a block from Campus Martius, and a large number of busy office buildings, the Bathtub Pub is in a prime location for late night, post-show or -game drinks and bar food, or for after-work cocktails. While the interior of the place isn't going to win any awards, it has a charming and refreshingly rustic, traditional design that will make you feel like you are in the set of a Cheers-esque sitcom. The drink prices are more than reasonable, and the menu, while modestly -sized, is some of the best greasy spoon food in town. Don't skip the Bathtub Pub next time you're walking by, you won't regret it.

St. Brigid's Bathtub Pub

129 Michigan Ave

Detroit, MI 48226

(313)962-0700

There is nothing horribly Irish about the menu, but according to AllMenus.com they serve (among unsurprising pub foods) these two features:

Potato Cheddar Ale Soup $3.00+ 
and 
Brigid's Burger $8.00An 8 oz. burger topped with bacon, caramelized onions, swiss and cheddar cheese, lettuce and tomatoes.

The first sounds about right, Brigit-wise; though she wouldn't have had access to potatoes in the fifth century, they are still pretty Irish, aren't they? Not sure about the ingredients of the burger, but hey.

In Minnesota there is another Brigidine pub, Brigid's Cross Irish Pub, 317 Beltrami Ave NW, Bemidji, MN 56601, USA.

Email:	brigids@brigidsirishpub.com
Phone:	(218) 444-0567
Address:	317 Beltrami Avenue Bemidji, MN 56601

BRIGID'S CROSS IRISH PUB & RESTAURANT is named for the patron saint of agriculture, farmers & fishermen, St. Brigid of Kildare. Our mission is to bring a piece of the Emerald Isle to you with traditional & unique Irish fare, premium imported & regional beer, fine Irish whiskey & a remarkable staff. We encourage the whole family to come in for an Irish adventure ~ without the jet lag. Whether it be traditional games & activities for the wee ones (or the young at heart), a night out on the town or a special occasion...make Brigid's Cross a part of your celebration.

The Story of Brigid's Cross

Brigids Cross takes it's name from Ireland's most well-known female patron saint, St. Brigid of Kildare, and her woven-reed cross. Also known as Mary Of The Gael, St. Brigid is widely known as the patron saint of agriculture, specifically dairy. She was allegedly quite the multi-tasker - establishing the first co-ed monastery, a school for decorative ironwork, feeding the hungry and she is even said to have been able to turn milk into ale! St. Brigid's Cross is traditionally woven in the early spring from young river rushes. It is then hung over doorways to protect the family and is still given to newlyweds and young families even today.

St. Brigid's patron saint day is February 1st. On that day at the pub we pay homage to St. Brigid and honor her miracle of turning milk into beer by offering a free pint to each of our customers and friends between 5 and 6 PM. The pub keeps a fresh supply of woven crosses from the river Shannon year-round for you to hang over your doors as well as jewelry fashioned after the Brigid Cross.

What better patron saint could a neighborhood pub have but one associated with feeding the hungry, protecting the family, and turning milk into beer? Whatever your persuasion, we think you will find comfort in the food, a bit of respite, and maybe even a little religion in every pint!

BeerSmith offers this recipe for Saint Brigid's Bath Water (beer):

St. Brigid's Bath Water - v1.1 

All Grain Recipe

Submitted By: derrickp (Shared) 
Members can download and share recipes

Batch Size: 5.65 gal	Style: Irish Red Ale ( 9D)
Boil Size: 6.38 gal	Style Guide: BJCP 2008
Color: 14.8 SRM	Equipment: Mythic Brewing
Bitterness: 23.0 IBUs	Boil Time: 60 min
Est OG: 1.055 (13.7° P)	Mash Profile: Single Infusion, Full Body
Est FG: 1.016 SG (4.1° P)	Fermentation: My Aging Profile
ABV: 5.2%	Taste Rating: 30.0

Ingredients

Amount	Name	Type	#
5 lbs	Munich Malt (9.0 SRM)	Grain	1
5 lbs	Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM)	Grain	2
12.00 oz	Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM)	Grain	3
10.40 oz	Caramel/Crystal Malt - 60L (60.0 SRM)	Grain	4
10.40 oz	Caramunich Malt (56.0 SRM)	Grain	5
0.32 oz	Bravo [14.5%] - Boil 60 min	Hops	6
0.25 oz	Galena [12.5%] - Boil 20 min	Hops	7
0.25 oz	Willamette [5.5%] - Boil 5 min	Hops	8
1 pkgs	Irish Ale (Wyeast Labs #1084)	Yeast	9

And Great Divide in Denver offered (but does not still offer) St. Bridget's Porter:

Great Divide St. Bridgets Porter (St. Brigids)

* picture credits
copyright may apply 

overall

77

68

style

Brewed by Great Divide Brewing Company
Style: Porter
Denver, Colorado USA

Serve in English pint, Shaker

bottled available

on tap unknown

Local Distribution

send corrections   |   shelftag     |   edit barcodes   |   update pic

RATINGS: 900   WEIGHTED AVG: 3.39/5   EST. CALORIES: 180   ABV: 6%

COMMERCIAL DESCRIPTION
St. Bridget, a legendary Irish saint, created a sensation by turning her bathwater into beer. What better way to celebrate her worthy miracle than with our zymurgistic tribute to her feat, St. Bridget’s Porter. St. Bridget’s is a smooth, elegant, and chocolaty brown porter. Brimming with coffee and chocolate characteristics from dark barley malts, St. Bridget’s is carefully hopped to provide the perfect complement to its malty robustness.

A Blessed Little Beer

Well, I should not be surprised by this, but I guess I was (I haven't tasted it--if anyone does, let me know what you think):

Cycle Saisonnier – Seasonal Saisons

∞∞∞∞∞∞∞

Mary of the Gael

Spring Saison

∞∞∞∞∞∞∞

St. Brigid’s Day is celebrated in Ireland at the time of Imbolic, a once pagan celebration of ‘summer in the belly of winter’. This release in our series of seasonal saisons is a refreshingly hoppy take on saison for springtime. Mary of the Gael has a simple base of pilsner malt, a touch of honey malt and is dry-hopped with a copious amount of floral hops

.

Alc. by Vol. 6.5% |  21 IBUs | 14 °Plato  | Light foods/Fish/Artisan Cheese/Asian | Best  at cellar temperature (55 °F)

Brigit & Beer Baths: Notes on a Tale by Cogitosus from the Perspective of a Beer Historian

"St Brigid's Lake of Beer," Michael O'Neill McGrath*

As often happens, while searching an unrelated topic I stumbled across an interesting article connected to Brigit. It tells a tale from Cogitosus regarding Brigit and beer. No self-respecting Brigit-Beer article should go without the famous poem attributed to her. So let us begin there:

I should like a great lake of beer for the King of Kings.
I should like the angels of Heaven to be drinking it through time eternal.
I should like excellent meats of belief and pure piety.
I should like the men of Heaven at my house.
I should like barrels of peace at their disposal.
I should like for them cellars of mercy.
I should like cheerfulness to be their drinking.
I should like Jesus to be there among them.
I should like the three Marys of illustrious renown to be with us.
I should like the people of Heaven, the poor, to be gathered around from all parts.

excerpt from 
St Brigid and the Bathwater

by Martyn Cornell

...While I was putting together the order of service, I even found a suitably beery quote fromThe Life of St Brigid the Virgin, written by a Kildare monk, Cogitosus Ua hAedha, around AD650, to use as one of the readings:

On another extraordinary occasion, this venerable Brigid was asked by some lepers for beer, but had none. She noticed water that had been prepared for baths. She blessed it, in the goodness of her abiding faith, and transformed it into the best beer, which she drew copiously for the thirsty. It was indeed He Who turned water into wine in Cana of Galilee Who turned water into beer here, through this most blessed woman’s faith.

Cogitosus, of course, was keen to chalk the bathwater-into-beer event up as a miracle, just like the one at the wedding at Cana, but there is, in fact, a possible non-miraculous explanation for how St Brigid was able to make the thirsty lepers happy. A record of a fire at the monastry of Clonard in Ireland around AD787 speaks of grain stored in ballenio, literally “in a bath”, which seems to mean the grain being soaked as part of the initial processes of malting. What St Brigid drew off, I’d suggest, may have been water from the ballenium where the grain was steeping in the first stage of malt-making.

Quite possibly, if the grain had begun to sprout wild yeasts had already started multiplying in the water, and making alcohol. Cogitosus heard the story, already more than a century old, about Brigid giving the lepers water from the ballenium to drink and, presumably because he knew nothing about brewing, thought this ballenium was an ordinary bath for washing in. While water from the grain steep might have made a passable ale substitute if you were a thirsty leper, for “bath water” to taste like ale must have seemed a miracle to the confused Cogitosus.

Ale was an important part of Irish society: the Crith-Gablach, an Irish law book compiled about the middle or end of the 7th century AD, declared that the “seven occupations in the law of a king” were:

Sunday, at ale drinking, for he is not a lawful flaith [lord] who does not distribute ale every Sunday; Monday, at legislation, for the government of the tribe; Tuesday, at fidchell [a popular Iron Age board game]; Wednesday, seeing greyhounds coursing; Thursday, at the pleasures of love; Friday, at horse-racing; Saturday, at judgment.”

Who’d be an Irish king, eh?

For the full article, including an old Irish poem on the best ales of the country, go to Martyn Cornell's Zythophile: Beer Now and Then. Click here for his article "Ancient Irish Ales". Martyn is the author of Amber Gold and Black: The History of Britain's Great Beers.

* "St. Brigid's Lake of Beer" by Bro. Mickey (Michael O'Neill McGrath) an Oblate of St. Francis de Sales.

Celtic Beer--From the Digital Medievalist

This posting comes from a blog I follow, Scéla: A Digital Medievalist’s Blog, by Lisa L. Spangenberg. My editing hand twitches a bit as I read it, but what the hey--enjoy!

·         January 19, 2014 by Lisa

Celtic Beer

2,550 year-old barley grains, post malting, from Eberdingen-Hochdorf

Ogma was a brewer, and so was Goibhniu, the smith god. Brigid was also a brewer, and there a many references to the consumption of beer in medieval Celtic texts. In that context the recent find that six specially constructed ditches previously excavated at Eberdingen-Hochdorf a 2,550-year-old Celtic settlement, were used to make high-quality barley malt, an essential beer ingredient. (You may recall Hochdorf as a principle Celtic site, where among other important finds in the museum is the grave of the Hochdorf prince.)

Archaeobotanist Hans-Peter Stika of the University of Hohenheim in Stuttgart has published a paper in which he discusses the results of chemical analysis of some of the thousands of charred grains of barley found in the six ditches. The paper, published on January 4, 20 in Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences is titled “Early Iron Age and Late Mediaeval malt finds from Germany—attempts at reconstruction of early Celtic brewing and the taste of Celtic beer.”

You can read the abstract, linked above, or download the .pdf of the paper, but the analysis of the malt, in the context of what we know about early brewing in the La Tène Period, fifth –fourth century BCE, Stika suggests that the beer would like have been somewhat smokey in character, with a sour taste (keep in mind that beer in this era would not have used hops).

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