More St. Patrick's Day:
How chefs get lucky
On St. Patrick's Day, it's easy drinking green
Why you should be drinking Irish whiskey on St. Patrick’s Day
Irish beers for St. Patrick's Day
Even more Irish Whiskey, per a partly Irish fellow
An Irish chef's picks for St. Paddy's fun

Alessandra Bulow (@abulow on Twitter) is Food & Wine's associate digital editor.

If foraging for shamrocks and downing marshmallow-filled cereal endorsed by a cartoon leprechaun hasn’t brought you the luck of the Irish by now, then it may be time to rethink your strategy on St. Patrick’s Day. From traditional dishes like noodles that symbolize longevity to a simple ham sandwich, superstitious chefs share their picks for good fortune.
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Ray Isle (@islewine on Twitter) is Food & Wine's executive wine editor. We trust his every cork pop and decant – and the man can sniff out a bargain to boot. Take it away, Ray.

Consider the Shamrock Shake. It’s green, it’s creamy, you can get it during the month of March, and since McDonald’s introduced the thing in 1970, they’ve sold more than 60 million of them - the equivalent of 39 gallons of Shamrock Shake for every single person currently alive in Ireland. That’s a whole lot of shake goin’ on.

But of course there are other things you can drink for St. Patrick’s Day. Green beer, well, yeah. I think we can safely move on from that addled inspiration. Ditto the giant foam leprechaun hats. So how about a green cocktail, then?
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Kate Krader (@kkrader on Twitter) is Food & Wine's restaurant editor. When she tells us where to find our culinary heart's desire, we listen up.

March Madness! No, not the omnipresent NCAA basketball brackets. I’m speaking of St. Patrick’s Day and the green shamrocks that are decorating the windows of just about every bar in America right now. You might be a St. Patrick’s Day purist who thinks it's the best day to celebrate Ireland’s underrated food and especially their drink; alternately, you might think March 17th is the best excuse to get absolutely wasted on food-coloring-tinted beer. Following are some places to celebrate, whether or not it's with green beer.
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Ray Isle (@islewine on Twitter) is Food & Wine's executive wine editor. We trust his every cork pop and decant – and the man can sniff out a bargain to boot. Take it away, Ray.

As an at least partly Irish sort of fellow (my mother’s father’s family), it’s heartening that Americans finally seem to have caught on to the appeal of Irish whiskey. Not to insult Scotch or Bourbon, but Irish has a mellow sweetness that’s awfully hard to resist—or it certainly seems that it’s hard to resist, given we’re drinking about two-thirds more of it than we were a mere five years ago.
 
What makes Irish whiskey distinctive (I can hear my ancestors saying besides the fact it comes from Ireland, ya big eejit?) is that it’s typically a blend of mixed-grain and single-malt whiskies, like a blended Scotch, but is usually distilled three times rather than two; also, the malted barley used for Irish is dried in kilns rather than over peat smoke, so it lacks the smoky, sometimes iodine-y character of many Scotches.
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5@5 is a daily, food-related list from chefs, writers, political pundits, musicians, actors, and all manner of opinionated people from around the globe.

We can all agree March 17 is a lovely day for a Guinness.

But if you're feeling the Irish spirit a bit more strongly like Jason Henry, general manager of  The Second Floor in Dallas, Texas, you might have better luck with a wee bit of whiskey.

Five Reasons Why You Should Be Drinking Irish Whiskey on St. Patrick’s Day: Jason Henry
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5@5 is a daily, food-related list from chefs, writers, political pundits, musicians, actors, and all manner of opinionated people from around the globe.

As we gear up to celebrate St. Patrick’s Day, everybody knows about Guinness–  but what about some of the unsung heroes of Irish beer and Irish-style beers that are available in the United States?

Ted Kenny, the owner of Top Hops Beer Shop in New York City, certainly isn't knocking the famous Irish stout, but there’s a lot more out there to try.

Here are five beers worth raising on March 17 - without the green dye, please.

Five Irish Beers for St. Patrick's Day: Ted Kenny

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