Serendipity by Oscar Farinetti

Author:Oscar Farinetti
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Schwartz Books Pty. Ltd.

26

GUINNESS

That fortuitous fire

WITH TEO MUSSO

Teo Musso was the first person in Italy to make unpasteurised artisan beer and sell it all over the country through restaurants and wine bars.

He started twenty-five years ago and found remarkable success pretty much straight away. The business has expanded, and his new Birrificio Agricolo Independente is a gem, providing good production capacity while maintaining the features of the original artisan brewery. These days he sells his beer almost everywhere in the world.

His business, Le Baladin, is actually a farm. He grows his own barley and Italian hops, so his bottles come out of a supply chain that’s totally within his control. Teo has devoted his life to this beverage, whether golden, amber, red or dark ale. He’s travelled a lot in the countries where beer-drinking is an integral part of their custom and tradition, including Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands and Ireland. For the Guinness story I instinctively took the road to Piozzo, a lovely little town on the border between the two Langhe regions of Barolo and Mondov to talk with Teo.

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Teo is a highly intelligent person and it’s always a pleasure to sit down with him for a chat – even better if we’re talking about beer with a glass of it in front of us.

I get straight to the point because I’m eager to hear about the history of Guinness. Guinness is synonymous with Ireland. It’s a dark beer, almost black, with a light creamy foam and an intense flavour. A beer not everyone finds palatable, but the world has fallen in love with it partly thanks to effective marketing through the images and slogans on its iconic posters.

Teo explains that the origin of the dark beer goes back to 1759, when its founder and master brewer, Arthur Guinness, opened his brewery in St James’s Gate, Dublin. The building was rented for 45 pounds a month, an amount that wasn’t exactly peanuts in those days, but the incredible thing is that the contract was for 9000 years. You read that right: 90 centuries. Initially they focused on the bitter styles of beer most popular at the time, and moved on later to making black stouts.

Some say it was serendipitous, whereas others think our master brewer was simply inspired by the existing English (or more specifically London) beers known as porters, which had more hops and a higher percentage of alcohol and were dry and – obviously – dark.

The name ‘porter’ came from the London street and river porters; ‘stout’ is a term that implies tenacity and robustness, but also pride; so porter stout meant a beer that was popular but strong, with an even higher alcohol content than other stouts.

Knowing Musso I can say he’s the kind of rational person who tends to steer clear of legends. But the fact is that even in the stories handed down over centuries, and no doubt adapted and revised over time, there’s always a grain of truth. When it comes to Guinness, the likelihood that

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