American craft beer snobs planning 2-3 week trip in 2015 - need advice

As beer snobs you are probably going to be worse off in Ireland outside big cities than the county 'capitals' and in general you are going to worse off in Ireland than you are in the US. That's the bad news. The good news is that it is better than it was ten or even five years ago as smaller brewing companies, and distilleries, have begun to get a foothold.

There are three or four smaller brewing companies in Ireland - Porterhouse and Galway Bay brewing company are two of the more prominent ones.

Porterhouse has bars in Dublin, Wicklow and Cork and do a nice range of beers, ales, stouts, porters and whatever. Their Dublin bars are barns and get packed with yoofs later in the evenings on weekends and I wouldn't darken their doorways at those times and they are generally quite busy anyway, often with tourists (particularly their Grafton Street-ish site). Their Oyster stout is recommended and they serve some Galway Bay brewery beers.

If you go to the Galway Bay brewing company website you can see their locations but they are mostly Dublin and Galway. Three of their Dublin bars - Against the Grain, Brewdock, and The Black Sheep - I have popped into on several occasions. Maybe a little hipster but good places. I am a sucker for Galway Hooker (named after a boat) but both the Galway Bay pubs and Porterhouse do a tasting menu tray and if you ask they will give you a taste of any beer.

As I said, outside of the bigger cities you are mostly into a no man's land of Guinness (which I love so I ain't complaining but if there is Hooker or a small brew on tap I'm going that), Heino, Carlsberg, Wife Beater and Tuborg.

You won't see much if anything of Porterhouse stuff outside their own bars or Galway Bay bars but Galway Hooker will pop up occasionally in random places. Which is nice.

If you are trying to decide on which Galway Bay pub to go to, I'd recommend the Black Sheep in Capel St - it is away from the tourists.

take day trips in a rental car around the island

If you are staying in a cottage in Kildare or Wicklow, you aren't going to get anywhere near the west of the country in a day trip. It's not this tiny small island where you can plant yourself in the middle and go anywhere in a day. You can drive to the W coast in 3 hours if you are starting from one end of one of the new big roads in Dublin, and ending near where one of them goes, but that leaves an awful lot of what is wonderful in Ireland out of reach. But if you are somewhere else, you'll typically only get 120 miles in 3 hours, and often not even that. And whilst the Wicklow mountains are a nice part of Ireland, there isn't a great deal to them and you'll have well exhausted the possibilities before your time is out. Most of the great parts of Ireland are in the west.

If I were you, I'd consider also hiring another cottage somewhere in the west for a week or so also. But if you hire a cottage in Kerry, say, you aren't going to see much more than Kerry and West Cork from there, though there is plenty in Kerry and West Cork for a week or 10 days even. If you are going for 3 weeks, there's something to be said for 3 bases.

Thanks a million for the great replies! I was a bit conflicted myself about how/when to split up our time between the west and Wicklow/Kildare - which I really am only visiting due to family connections. So perhaps one week in the east, one in the west makes the most sense...

Another question - how awful is the weather really off-peak tourist season? My husband and I were toying with the idea of going next March, around St. Patricks, but are worried the weather might make it miserable. I realize summer is the best weather of the year, but it would be great if we could still have a nice trip at a less expensive/less crowded time of year. We're interested in any kind of food/beer/cultural/music festivals that happen around the country and planning around that.

Thanks all,
Kelly

how awful is the weather really off-peak tourist season? My husband and I were toying with the idea of going next March

The weather is above all unpredictable. There are averages, but the reality varies considerably from one year to another. So you could be lucky, or you could be unlucky. But on average there are patterns, and according to that average late summer to midwinter is the wettest time of year, and late winter into early summer, on average, is the (relatively) dry season. So March is actually a fairly average to dry month, especially later on, though April-June would, on average, be better.

great if we could still have a nice trip at a less expensive/less crowded time of year

What you can find is that if you go at too low a season, you can find that everything is closed up, so you can actually find it hard to get somewhere to stay, and not so cheap because it was actually trouble to provide you service. Sure you'll get (relatively) great prices some places where there is a year-round trade, which will tend to be the more upmarket places which were relatively expensive in the first place. But for B&Bs and the like, I find the best times to go Ireland in that respect tend to be somewhat, but not too far, off season, times like May and September, when people are still expecting tourists and competing to get them.

Agree with the other replies, Dublin is good for craft beers (well, good by ireland standards, terrible by world standards), but outside dublin is terrible. Almost all towns just have the usual same 7 or 8 beers. Ireland is terrible for beer.
Wicklow is a very nice place to stay, but probably the most expensive. This is because it's half an hour away from Dublin and so picturesque, it tends to be a very popular place for Dublin people to go. If I were you I'd try and break the trip up a bit more. 3 nights in Dublin is plenty, if you want to go to wicklow, 3 days there is plenty too. Then move to the west.
I wouldn't bother with Kildare. Wicklow is nice, kildare isn't bad, but fairly boring scenery wise. By "west" I'd go with any county with an atlantic coast, from Donegal down to Cork, all very nice. Donegal being my favourite. Best scenery and least spoiled.

In terms of craft beer, The Headline on the South Circular Road has a good Irish selection, L. Mulligan in Stoneybatter has a great selection and good food offerings, more convenient to the City Centre are Bull & Castle across from Christchurch Cathedral, Against the Grain on Wexford Street and Alfie Burns in the basement of the Conrad Hotel.

I went on a 2 week long road trip of Ireland in February a few years ago. It was mad! There were a lot of places closed up but on the plus side hardly any tourists or traffic. If you're properly equipped I wouldn't let 'really off season' put you off.
Going round the Ring of Kerry and up the west coast in wild weather was unforgettable.