Long-time Guinness ambassador Ryan Wagner estimates that 90 percent of American bartenders know that if a customer orders a pint of Guinness Draught Stout, there’s something different they have to do.
“They don’t know exactly what, but they know they’re supposed to do something,” says the Chicago-based Wagner, head of marketing and brand partnerships for Guinness Open Gate Brewery, who’s drunk over a thousand pints of the black stuff by now.
Maybe half know to commence with the famous two-part pour: Tilt a 20-ounce tulip glass to 45 degrees beneath the tap and let the (42.8-degree) beer cascade down the side, aiming for the gold harp, until it’s three-quarters full. Allow it to settle for 86 seconds then top it off, yielding the perfect pint of dry Irish stout in, oh, I don’t know, 119.5 seconds?
As for the rest, “the vast array of things that happen is really remarkable,” Wagner says. Depending on what they’ve heard, they might know to tilt the glass 45 degrees, or perhaps they’ll open the tap halfway, suppressing the surge of nitrogenated liquid that creates that telltale creamy head. Maybe they’ll pour the beer in two or three or even four parts, leaving the remaining third or two-thirds or three-quarters of the beer to settle for varying stretches of time. Or they’ll fill it in one rushing go till its foamy head resembles a root beer float, thudding it on the bar to settle the bubbles like it’s a sheet tray of macaron batter.
