100 Things To Do In Holland Before You Die: #4 -Take A Break From Your Inner Dutch At The Curragh Irish Pub

Nestled in the heart of Downtown Holland sits the Curragh Irish Pub. Opened in 2004, The Curragh has garnered a reputation as being one of the best Irish pubs in the West Michigan area - their famed Guinness-breaded fish and chips are, according to some, the most traditional fish and chips in North America...I'm really reaching back trying to remember who told me that; it was a dear sweet old woman who I was assisting when I worked at a business in Downtown Holland, but I cannot remember where. The fish and chips are really stinkin' good, but then again, so are the mozzarella sticks. Can't sleep on their burgers either, although after CoVid-era supply chain disruptions, Curragh has revamped their menu a little.

With 24 beers on draught at any given time, they've got a great beer selection, too - Two nitro lines keep the Guinness flowing all the time, which leaves one nitro tap up for rotation. They've always got a solid stock of beers from the UK - as mentioned, Guinness is on all the time, and they'll otherwise rotate through UK-based beers like Kilkenny, Old Speckled Hen, Smithwick's, Harp Lager, or Boddington's (just to throw out a few examples). They've got some Michigan craft beer staples, and a healthy assortment of other craft brews as well.

Somewhere in the middle of it all, I uncovered this menu from The Curragh from sometime between 2012 and 2015.

Comments

Junk Food Review: Chocolatey Payday.

I saw an ad on my Instagram page for a chocolate-covered Payday bar. Jokingly, I took a screenshot, and posted it on my stories asking the question "Isn't this just a Baby Ruth?" A friend responded by saying that no, a Baby Ruth is peanuts surrounding caramel and chocolate-flavored nougat; the chocolate-covered Payday is peanuts in caramel-flavored nougat, dipped in chocolate. Now, candy bars are made from a few common ingredients: Chocolate, peanuts, nougat, and caramel. Chocolate and nougat is something like a 3 Musketeers. Chocolate, nougat, and caramel is something like a Milky Way. All 4 makes a Snickers bar. Chocolate and Peanuts is a Mr. Goodbar. Chocolate and caramel is either a Caramello or a type of Milky Way. Peanuts and caramel (no chocolate) is a Payday. And, chocolate, peanuts, and caramel led to the confusion that took me down the road to writing this article in the first place. I did what any sane person w...

The Eddie Bentz Bank Robbery

Prohibition is one of the most storied periods in American history. Urban myths and legends abound nationwide, with tales of folk heroes like Al Capone, Babyface Nelson, and John Dillinger. Tall tales are woven around organized crime, wild bootleggers, underground saloons, and well-dressed gangsters. There's something uniquely American about the DIY ethos of taking matters into your own hands, making illegal alcohol, and selling it through clandestine channels; stickin' it to the man like those in the illegal alcohol industry did. These stories are immortalized in movies like The Road To Perdition and Public Enemies, as well as TV series like HBO's Boardwalk Empire and, well, PBS's Prohibition. Many lakeshore towns in Western Michigan have tales of organized crime and bootlegging. Easy access to Lake Michigan meant that bootleggers had easy access to boat routes, safely out of reach of authorities. Booze was funneled in from Canada, then taken by boat to cities all aro...

What's The Deal With Charlie's Dump?

Charlie's Dump, the Georgetown Soccer Bowl, and Rosewood Park all describe the same common area in Jenison, Michigan, at the northeast corner of 20th Ave. and Rosewood St. It's, simply put, a giant pit surrounded by residential subdivisions (and lately, a nice playground). It was our local sledding hill. It was where we'd go in the winters. Every year, it seemed, one kid would come to school with a broken arm. There were low-key "gangs" that would push and shove you if you went down the wrong side of the 4-sided structure. And, late at nights, the bad kids (you know, the ones who would smoke cigarettes underneath the Rush Creek bridge on 12th Ave. or ride BMX bikes behind the Pizza Hut on Baldwin) would tip over the port-a-potties and push them down the hill. Starting at the rim and going down the hill, there's a bump about halfway down that served as a launch ramp for kids on sleds. The really cool kids could manipulate their sleds mid-air, doi...

Tulip City Dispatch

Search This Blog