Picture a pack of Irish butter in your fridge with “Leprechaun” across the front. It nearly happened. When the Irish Dairy Board went looking for a name for its butter in 1962, Leprechaun was one of the last six on the list.
Sixty names, then six
The story starts in 1961, when the Irish Dairy Board was set up to promote and export Irish milk and dairy products. A year later it had a product to sell and no name for it. Sixty suggestions came in, and they were cut down to six: Buttercup, Shannon Gold, Leprechaun, Tub-o-Gold, Golden Farm and Kerrygold.
Kerrygold got the nod, and the butter went on sale in the UK in 1962. That is all in Kerrygold’s own history of the brand, which is the source for everything on this page. We think the board chose well. Buttercup and Golden Farm could be anyone’s butter, and Leprechaun belongs on a cereal box.
Germany came next, Ireland came last
Here is the part that surprises people. Kerrygold also found an early market in Germany, where the brand says it has since become the number one butter brand, and where a street is even named after it: Kerrygoldstrasse.
And at home? Kerrygold was only put on sale to the Irish public in 1973, eleven years after its UK launch. For a decade the butter that carried Ireland’s name abroad was not in Irish shops under that name. Today the brand says it is the number one butter brand in Ireland too.
The cows behind it
Kerrygold says its milk comes from grass-fed cows on about 14,000 small family farms in Ireland. That is the brand’s own figure, from its 2022 history, so take it as theirs and not ours. Whatever the exact number, it is a reminder that the butter on the table starts as grass in a field.
We have written about Irish butter before. If you want to know why it tastes the way it does, read why we love Kerrygold butter so much. For the American side of the story, there is Kerrygold’s rise to the top of the US butter aisle, and for the old Cork trade behind it all, the building in Cork that set the world price of butter. You can also make your own with our homemade butter recipe.
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How to make brown soda bread for good butter (serves 8)
Good butter deserves good bread, and nothing carries it better than a warm slice of brown soda bread. This one takes ten minutes to mix and no yeast. For a longer version, see our Irish brown soda bread recipe, or our soda bread guide.
Ingredients
- 400 g wholemeal flour
- 100 g plain flour, plus extra for dusting
- 1 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 400 to 450 ml buttermilk
- Salted Irish butter, to serve
Method
- Heat the oven to 200°C (180°C fan). Dust a baking tray with flour.
- Sift both flours, the bicarbonate of soda and the salt into a large bowl, tipping in any bran left in the sieve.
- Make a well in the middle and pour in 400 ml of buttermilk. Mix quickly with one hand until you have a soft, slightly sticky dough. Add a little more buttermilk only if the flour is dry.
- Tip the dough onto a floured surface and shape it into a round about 4 cm thick, handling it as little as you can.
- Place on the tray and cut a deep cross in the top.
- Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, until the loaf sounds hollow when tapped underneath.
- Cool on a wire rack for at least 20 minutes, then slice thickly and spread with plenty of butter.
Which name would you have picked for the butter: Kerrygold or Leprechaun?
Sources
- A Kerrygold History, Kerrygold, 6 June 2022
Checked November 2026.
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