It is early evening in Roppongi, the pub is filling up before the Friday rush, and someone has ordered a pear cider before the apple version even crosses their mind. It is a quieter choice, the kind that suits a quieter mood — soft, pale gold, gentler than the original. If that specific glass is part of your week back home, it travels. Magners Pear ships to Japan in cases of twenty-four, and the Friday session does not need to change.
The softer side of Tipperary’s cider tradition
Magners Irish Cider Pear Beer is produced by Bulmers Ltd, part of the C&C Group, whose parent operation was founded in 1935 in Clonmel, County Tipperary. The original Magners apple cider built the brand’s international reputation — pale gold, crisp, served over ice in a pint glass. The Pear expression, also known as perry, takes that same Tipperary cider-making foundation and applies it to pears rather than apples, producing a cider with a noticeably different character from the original while remaining recognisably part of the same family.
The result is pale gold in the glass, with a clear pear aroma and natural sweetness, a soft mouthfeel, and lower acidity than the apple version. Where the original Magners has a sharper, drier edge, the Pear expression is rounder and more approachable — often the cider that introduces someone to the category, or the one chosen when the apple version feels too dry for the occasion.
Bulmers Ltd (C&C Group) has produced the Pear expression as part of its wider cider range for years, distributed across Ireland, the UK, and international markets that carry Magners. It is the lighter, friendlier expression — a description that holds up in the glass as much as on the label.
How Magners Irish Cider Pear Beer is drunk at home
Sláinte! (SLAWN-cha) — Irish Gaelic for “health,” the toast that opens a round at any Irish table, whether the glass holds Guinness, whiskey, or a soft pear cider. It is said with a raised glass and direct eye contact, and at a Friday pub session it returns with every fresh round, the rhythm of the evening marked out in single syllables.
Irish stew is the pub-meal standard — lamb, potato, and root vegetables, slow-cooked into a deep bowl with brown bread on the side. The soft mouthfeel and lower acidity of the Pear cider make it a gentler companion to the stew than the original apple version, rounding out the richness of the lamb rather than cutting sharply through it. Fish and chips — the Friday tradition rooted in Catholic abstinence days — pair naturally with the Pear expression too: the sweetness of the pear sits alongside the salt and vinegar of the chips in an easy, uncomplicated way.
Boxty — the potato pancake, the older country food that predates the modern pub menu — is the third pairing, and one where the Pear cider’s softness matches the simplicity of the dish without either one overpowering the other. Friday pub sessions and St. Patrick’s Day, March 17, are the two occasions where Magners Pear appears reliably — often as the second bottle of the evening, after someone has already had the original and wants something gentler.
How to drink it in Japan
The over-ice method works for the Pear expression exactly as it does for the original Magners: a pint glass filled with ice, the cider poured slowly over it, given thirty seconds to settle before drinking. The lower acidity and natural sweetness of the pear hold up well to dilution, which makes the over-ice serving particularly suited to this version. Pair it cold with a FamilyMart pear or mixed-fruit sandwich — the soft sweetness of the filling and the pear cider are working in the same gentle register, assembled in under a minute.
For a sit-down pairing, try it alongside chawanmushi — the silken Japanese egg custard, served warm at izakayas and kaiseki restaurants. The soft mouthfeel of the Pear cider and the delicate, savoury custard occupy the same unhurried register, and the natural pear sweetness lifts the dish gently rather than competing with it. It is a pairing that surprises people who expect cider to only work with fried food.
Spring is the natural season in Japan — St. Patrick’s Day in March brings Tokyo’s Irish community out for the largest parade of its kind in Asia, and the Pear expression tends to be the bottle that appears for those who want something lighter than the original on a long afternoon. At an Irish pub in Roppongi, a bottle of Magners Pear runs ¥1,000 to ¥1,400. By the case from Omori Mart, the per-bottle cost is noticeably lower.
Get Magners Irish Cider Pear Beer delivered in Japan
Magners Irish Cider Pear Beer (330ml x 24 bottles) is available now at Omori Mart, with nationwide delivery across Japan.
- Free shipping on orders over ¥15,000
- Konbini payment accepted at FamilyMart, 7-Eleven, and Lawson — plus bank transfer and card
- Nationwide delivery
Rakuten and Amazon Japan do not carry Magners Pear or other Irish home-country brands. Omori Mart does.
[Shop Magners Irish Cider Pear Beer →]
https://omorimart.com/product/magners-irish-cider-pear-beer-330ml-x-24-bottles/
Sláinte in Clonmel, pear sweetness in the glass since 1935. Kanpai (乾杯) in Tokyo, where the Friday session and the izakaya share more in common than either tradition usually admits. The softer cider connects both tables just as well.
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