Touch o' the Irish

Local businessmen expand their pub ownership

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When the Auld Dubliner opens this Friday at Lake Las Vegas' MonteLago Village, owner David Copley said it will all be thanks to a slip of the tongue.

"Truthfully, my big mouth started it all," he said.

After moving to California from Limerick, Ireland, about 18 years ago, Copley said nights out with his friends would sometimes end in visits to local Irish pubs.

"After I'd had a few, I'd always start rambling about how I could do better," he said. "One day a friend called me on it. He had a restaurant that was going out of business and asked me if I wanted to buy it."

In 1997, Copley and his business partner Eric Johnson bought the former restaurant from their friend and opened their first pub, called Limerick's, in Long Beach, Calif.

"It was more of an Americanized Irish pub," Johnson said. "It was very green, and there were lots of shamrocks everywhere. Because David was involved with it, there were also a lot of authentic characteristics to it, but the design and concept were very American."

When Copley and Johnson decided to open a second pub, this time in Squaw Valley, they decided to follow a more authentic Irish path. They wanted to foster the warm, local atmosphere of the "public houses" Copley was used to in Ireland, and the first Auld Dubliner was born.

"David brings so much to the table because he really knows what Irish pubs mean," Johnson said. "It's a local atmosphere where friends and family can gather to have a good time. We'll never charge a cover. We're here for the people -- our pubs are like a second home."

The entire interior of each Auld Dubliner pub was imported from Ireland, and Johnson said even the decorations on the walls were imported from old Irish farmhouses to infuse the pubs with a little Old World charm. The interior of the Auld Dubliner is about 2,500 square feet, and the pub also will have a 900-square-foot outdoor patio area.

"I missed home, so I decided to bring it here," Copley said. "I want the pub to have a very welcoming atmosphere. It doesn't matter if you're 21 or 81, when you come in you can sit at the bar and talk to new people and be social."

Copley said the Auld Dubliner's food also reflects his years in Ireland, from traditional items like Irish boxty stew, shepherd's pie and sausage rolls made from his mother's recipes to more contemporary menu items.

"Ireland's food has changed a lot recently," he said. "It's gone from boiled meat and potatoes on a plate to some of the best food I've ever had, and our kitchen will follow that. We're taking the best ingredients and putting them together to make old and new Irish dishes."

In addition to the food, Auld Dubliner will serve a variety of traditional Irish libations, including Guinness, Harp and Smithwick's beers and Jameson Irish Whiskey and Bushmills Irish Whiskey.

Copley and Johnson also will bring live entertainment to the pub.

"It'll be Irish entertainment," Copley said. "Traditional folk songs, Irish drinking songs, you know, toe-tapping music. The pub won't have a stage, so the performers will play in the middle of the pub, the way they do in pubs in Ireland."

St. Patrick's Day events at MonteLago will include a St. Patrick's Day Leprechaun in MonteLago Village from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Friday and 5 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Saturday. Performances by Irish dancers will start from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. Friday and 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday, and horse and carriage rides will run from 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Friday and 2 p.m. to 9 p.m. Saturday.