Back in the early 1800s, the Guinness brewers were faced with a challenge: how do we keep our beer fresh on long sea voyages to distant drinkers? If you haven’t heard, Guinness brewers love a challenge, so they put their ingenious heads together and purposely brewed a beer containing extra hops, acting as a natural preservative.

Did it work? Of course, it did! In fact, the recipe worked so well, the rich and characterful porter was quickly shipped to the Caribbean, America, Africa and Southeast Asia.