No New Years party from Seattle to Shanghai would be complete without a verse or two of Auld Lang Syne sung at midnight, accompanied by acquaintances both auld and new. This year like others, around the bar at Seattle’s Pike Brewing Company, regulars, Pike staff and out of town guests lifted a pint of Pike Auld Acquaintance holiday ale and sang that familiar, heart-warming tune. Few knew who wrote it, or if they did, knew much about the extraordinary composer Robert Burns and the monumental contribution that he made to music, poetry, and prose.

On Sunday, January 24, from 5:30 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. Pike will host it’s Third Annual Robbie Burns Night in their Seattle Micro Brewery Museum to celebrate the Scottish bard’s birthday, this year his 251st. Pike owners, Rose Ann and Charles Finkel, will kick off the evening by tapping a firkin of Pike Kilt Lifter Scotch Style Ale, seasoned with oak that was sterilized in Lagavulin Single Malt Islay Scotch Whisky. Burns wrote “Good ale keeps the hear aboon.” According to Charles, “Rabbie, as he was known to friends, loved ale as well as whisky” so Pike will also feature a flight of single malt whisky from distilleries in the Highlands (Burns wrote, “My heart’s in the highlands…”) Lowlands, Islay, and Speyside, as well as an American whiskey flight, both at special prices for the evening.

As the clock strikes 6:30 p.m. a bag piper will ‘Pike in the Haggis’. Both traditional and vegetarian haggis will be available. Pike Burns’ night buffet will include cockie-leekie soup, “Mc” Solly’s (Pure Food Fish Market) famous Pike Place Market smoked salmon, organic vegetables, “tatties and neeps,” and bread pudding with Kilt Lifter Hard Sauce. Traditional Burns’ Night entertainment includes poetry reading (“Ode to the Haggis”); pipe music, (Amazing Grace and others) a poem (“Some cannot eat that want it: But we hae meat and we can eat, Sae let the Lord be thankit”) songs, (My heart’s in the highland and John Barleycorn) and fun. We will, of course, toast Robbie Burns by singing Auld Lang Syne. A song book will be provided. Cost of buffet and entertainment is $25.00 per person plus tax and gratuity.

Robert Burns was born in 1799, a time of revolution in Scotland, France and America. He remained a man of the people throughout this short life and preferred to write in the Scottish dialect rather than English. He was raised on a Lowland farm and had six siblings. Whisky was kept on the sideboard and a dram or two was enjoyed before breakfast and spending the day toiling to grow plump summer barley, the lifeblood of both beer and whisky. He wrote “John Barleycorn, Thou king o’grain!” Burns began writing poetry, about his first love, at age 15. “Tam O’ Shanter”, “Coming through the Rye”, “My love is like a Red, Red, Rose”, and “Auld Lang Syne.” These songs and poems crown a mosaic of over 500 works as sensual and pertinent today as when they were penned in the 18th century.

3rd Annual Robbie Burns Evening
Sunday, January 24, 2010
The Museum Room – The Pike Brewing Company
1415 1st Avenue, Seattle, WA 98101
Buffet and entertainment $25 plus tax and gratuity
Pint Special Kilt Lifter Scotch Ale $6
Scotch Whisky Flight $16 (regularly $20)
American Whiskey Flighty $14 (regularly $18)
RSVP to Michael St. Clair 206.812-6613