Drinks

Black and Tan

I know I normally do cocktails on Fridays, but Sunday is the Super Bowl and I thought a beer drink would be more suitable than a cocktail made with hard alcohol. While most people drink beer out of the bottle during football season, there are those that choose to consume the elixir from a nice pilsner glass. Drinking the beer from a glass allows you to not only enjoy a good draft beef, but also allows the drinker to have those specialty drinks like a Black and Tan.

A Black and Tan is probably one of the simplest drinks to mix together as it’s half Bass Pale Ale and half Guinness. That’s all there is to it… which is why it tends to be one of the more popular drinks found in bars and pubs across the world.

The Black and Tan has a long history. It’s been around since the late-1800’s and was created in English pubs by combining a porter and a pale ale. While most Americans hear “Black and Tan” and think of the drink and its color combination, the Irish hear the term and think of something else entirely: the English paramilitary soldiers recruited by the British government around 1920 to help put down the Irish uprising that led to the Irish War of Independence.  The soldiers were called black and tans because their uniforms were a mix of black and tan khaki. They were accused of some of the worst atrocities of the Irish War of Independence, including burning villages, torture, abduction and political murder.

No matter what you think of when you hear the term Black and Tan, it’s still a delicious drink that deserves to be consumed on game day. Even better, it’s definitely classier than that same old bottle of Bud.

Black and Tan

Ingredients:

  • 8 ounces pale ale (such as Harps or Bass)
  • 8 ounces stout (such as Guinness)

Directions:

  1. Pour the pale ale into a chilled pilsner glass. Gradually pour the stout on top and serve.