Deschutes-sur-Willamette

The stealthy opening of Deschutes' Portland brewpub -- it's been open all week -- means I got scooped by several Beervana commentators. Better late than never, Carla and I went over there for lunch today on the official Grand Opening. At least we got some commemorative pint glasses for our effort.

It was probably a good strategic move to open a few days early, to take some of the pressure off, considering Hopworks' fire-code-busting opening day six weeks ago. Maybe it's a different story tonight, but the lunch crowd was manageable. The restaurant tables didn't really fill up until about noon, and as far as I could tell there was never a wait.

The Deschutes Pearl District pub is a great addition to the Portland scene, especially since they're actually brewing there. Their first Portland brew is on tap right now, the Armory XPA, named after the garrison-turned-theater across the street. It's a well-done Northwestern Pale Ale, with very floral hops.

I suppose the "X" in XPA is for "extra", though of course these extra pale ales turn out darker than the pales. On the other hand, there's a code-switching pun here: "ex-pee-ay" is how you pronounce the French verb "expier" -- to do penance or to make reparation. I can't help it, I loved the headline on the Champagne of Blogs' review -- "Deschutes: French for 'Watch out, Bridgeport'" -- and now I can't get the French connection out of my brain. So if there's something troubling you, some sin you have to make up for, go XPA it with a couple of pints.

John Foyston says there are 16 tap handles, but I think some of them just pour root beer, because I can only come up with 12 beers served. I forgot to take home the seasonal beer menu, but between the Deschutes website and my memory, here are the beers that were on tap today:

• Mirror Pond Pale Ale
• Black Butte Porter
• Obsidian Stout
• Bachelor Bitter
• Cascade Ale
• Inversion IPA
• Cinder Cone Red
• Armory XPA
• Hop Henge IIPA
  
• 2005 Mirror Mirror Barleywine
  
• The Abyss
• Green Lake Organic Ale

There were also two cask engines; today they had Black Butte and Bachelor Bitter. The cask Bitter was served too cold, but maybe they'll get that straightened out as they get settled in. As usual, Mirror Mirror was a thing of beauty. The 20 oz. pints were $4.25, served in a Guinness-shaped glass -- I assume it's really 20 oz. -- or 10 oz. for $2.50. Big brews like Abyss and Mirror Mirror are served 10 oz. at a time in a snifter for $3.50. They'll fill a half-gallon growler to go for $10 (more for the heavyweights).

The decor is Northwest lodge through and through: big wood rafters, a stone fireplace, and chainsaw sculptures. The food seemed pretty good to us -- we each had burgers from the $9.50-11.50 burger menu. My french fries were drab and greasy, but the salads were decent. We were intrigued enough to try the hop cheesecake, but we didn't really pick up any hop flavor. Maybe the Mirror Mirror was to blame for that.

Let's talk about what might have been.... Two or three years ago, I noticed a banner on the side of the building on the northeast corner of 34th and Belmont. It said "Future home of Deschutes Public House". That was exciting -- one of Oregon's best breweries opening a pub in our neighborhood. But the banner was soon down, apparently because Deschutes made the deal for the current location in the Pearl, and the low-key Side Street Tavern opened on SE 34th instead. It's hard to imagine getting a pub and a brewery into the Side Street space, so although Southeast lost a pub, Portland gained a brewery. Whatever the case, welcome to Portland, Deschutes!

The Widmer Gasthaus

We have an embarrassment of riches in Portland. There's so much excellent beer here, that we get to look down our nose a little bit at any brewery that gets too big, like Widmer, the 11th largest brewery in the U.S. by sales last year. Widmer Hefeweizen is ubiquitous, available in every convenience store, pizza joint and tavern in town. Well, not the Green Dragon -- case in point! -- though Widmer will be featured at this Tuesday's Meet the Brewer.

There are many reasons to rise above our beer snobbishness and open our hearts to Widmer -- not least of which is the fact that the beer they sell in such vast quantities is actually good beer. Furthermore, the Widmer brothers were there at the beginning of the craft brew revolution in Oregon, long before hangers-on such as myself, and they still support the grassroots by offering homebrewers access to their brewing facility through the Collaborator project. Finally, there's the Gasthaus: the restaurant attached to the brewery, where Widmer serves a number of interesting beers that are unavailable anywhere else. Good food, too.

I dropped into the Gasthaus a couple days ago as part of my Alt quest. Turns out that a Dusseldorf Alt was one of the first beers the Widmers brewed, and it is apparently always on tap at the Gasthaus, but nowhere else. The Widmer Alt is a well-done beer, and matches the style guidelines very well: a dark, dry beer, with a bitter edge but almost a nutty flavor to the malt underneath. Compared to other local Alts I've had recently, it's more polished and flavorful than the Collaborator Alt I had at Belmont Station; it's less fruity and more bitter than Corey's Evolution Amber; and it's not a wacky hop-bomb like the Lucky Lab's Crazy Ludwig's Alt. It's not a style I love enough to have every day, but I'll certainly revisit it on future trips to the Gasthaus. I still need to track down a real Dusseldorf Alt to compare these all to.

Of course the restaurant has taps that represent Widmer's bottled-beer lines, but in addition to the Alt they had eight more taps that you can only get there. The Belgian Golden didn't impress me much at the Cheers to Belgian Beers festival, and I wasn't in the mood for a lager or barleywine, but I was happy to see that they had the NW Red on tap. This was the "W '06" special yearly bottling from a couple years ago, a tasty brew indeed. The W '08 Crimson Wheat, while drinkable, is nowhere near as interesting as the previous W's.

Speaking of W's, the first one -- the W '05 IPA -- was so good, that it became a regular offering: Broken Halo. This is what I'm talking about when I say that Widmer's mass quantities of consumables are still really good. Broken Halo's renown has spread across the country, to the point where it was a favorite of my buddy Lee before he even visited Portland. Just last month, another less-beer-obsessed friend in Austin told me -- without being able to remember the brewery name -- that it's the only beer he buys these days. And here's an excellent stunt from the blogosphere: a blind-tasting "tournament" of 32 IPAs, seeded by their ratebeer ranking. Broken Halo won, even though it was ranked 24th by the master beer-raters.

Other delights that the Gasthaus has offered in the past are the KGB Imperial Stout, aged in bourbon barrels; and Noggin Grog, Widmer's entry in last year's Oregon Brewer's Festival. A lot of beer snobs dissed Noggin Grog -- a so-called Imperial Wit -- but I loved it. Sure there's no such thing as an Imperial Wit, but it was a big, tasty beer.

The Gasthaus location, with a nice view of the Fremont Bridge, is right on the edge of a gritty industrial area, though its near neighbors are the trendy 820/Mint and the retro-chic McMenamins' White Eagle. Despite the fact that it's walled in by massive freeway overpasses, a trip to the Gasthaus makes a nice little bike excursion -- the Interstate bike lane connects with the Eastbank Esplanade right by the Steel bridge. You probably wouldn't bicycle the kids there, though -- the car traffic moves fast on Interstate, and the other route along Russell Street is kid-friendly enough on the way down, but will have them cursing you on the way back up the hill, if you're not already cursing yourself.

Hooray for Hopworks!

Procrastination makes the world go 'round. I'm not really accusing Hopworks Urban Brewery of procrastinating, but when Christian Ettinger's pub finally opened yesterday after a year of delays, it definitely drew a crowd. Hundreds of people pressed together drinking beer -- it was like the Holiday Beer Fest with glass mugs instead of plastic. Maybe that's why a keg of Kentucky Christmas was on tap.

We've been getting a taste of Hopworks beer for quite a while now, starting with the classic IPA. Then the winter warmer Abominabale was out at a few places, and more recently it's been possible to find the Lager and the Deluxe Organic Ale around town. HUB is part of the talented Class of '07 Oregon breweries, so expectations were high as we elbowed our way into the grand opening of Hopworks' pub for our Tuesday Pub Night. We were not disappointed, the beers were amazingly good.

Lindsey was executing the Beerfest-inspired maneuver of "get beer; get back in line" when I arrived, so I had a taste of his Kentucky Christmas (bourbon-aged Abominabale, I think) while we waited in line. Dave showed up in time to get in on that first round; miraculously we snagged a booth and crammed in there with Brett and Chris when they showed up. With that kind of manpower, we were able to run through the beers on tap:

• Seven Grain Stout: smooth and rich, with coffee and chocolate flavors
• Crosstown Pale: floral and pretty, maybe even tastier than the IPA
• El Diablo: a Belgian golden ale, strong and delicious
• Cultivator Doppelbock: sweet and malty, right on
• Kentucky Chrismas: warm and tasty
• HUB Lager: I'm not a fan of the style, but it was very drinkable
• IPA: full-bodied, flavorful, classic Portland IPA
  
• DOA: good as always
• Velvet ESB: smooth but a little unremarkable

The IPA has quickly become a well-loved Portland staple, but as good as the HUB IPA is, the first four beers in the list were the big winners at our table. That's four pretty distinct styles, and they were all right on target -- we were astonished that Christian and his assistant brewer Ben Love were able to capture the styles so well. In particular, I almost always wrinkle my nose at micro-brewed doppelbocks, because I can't get that candy-beer taste of Paulaner Salvator out of my mind. But Cultivator -- while not a Salvator clone -- had the sweetness, the roastiness, but not the bad aftertaste that seems to come with U.S. doppelbocks. We complimented Christian on the smoothness of it, and he said, "yeah, it's got some age on it", which Brett interpreted for us to mean that it had been lagering for a long time.

Similarly, El Diablo nailed the Belgian style. Being true to style is one thing, but that's a minor consideration -- the most important thing is that it was delicious, and even "I hate Belgians" Dave was smacking his lips. I really can't think of one defect to report about El Diablo.

In addition to the beers listed above, there were two cask engines, one with DOA and one with IPA. Both are excellent on cask. I mentioned the glass mugs above: honest pint sticklers will be pleased to note that the Hopworks mugs have a 0.4 liter mark on them, about 3/4 inch below the top. Google informs me that 0.4 liters is about 13.5 fluid ounces, so we're probably looking at a 14 or 15 ounce pour here. But the point is, you know what you're getting.

Christian and Ben were working the taps and tables right up until closing time. That's Christian chatting with Lindsey in this photograph (and that's the back of Ben's head). The pub has a great atmosphere -- it will be a little more comfortable when it's a regular-sized crowd -- with high ceilings and a good mixture of booths and tall tables. There is lots of room at the bar, and lots of interesting spaces: an open loft with pinball machines; a semi-private 8-person cubbyhole table complete with a gas lamp overhead; patio areas on the side and in the back. Kids are welcome in the restaurant area and the loft.

For more information on Hopworks, check out John Foyston's recent writeup. Jeff Alworth has some better pictures than I do; I forgot my camera and just did the cellphone thing. It's really exciting to have HUB in the neighborhood, after so much anticipation. It's nice to see that it was worth the wait, they've created a nice space and fantastic beers.

The Other Super Dog

It would be great to have lunch every day at Higgins... get the lunch special or the burger, and have a cask-conditioned pint. But in these troubled times, when the "fiscal conservatives" who added $5 trillion to the national debt are overdrawn on their own bank accounts, some cheaper options are needed. Luckily, right around the corner from Higgins is SuperDog, a hole-in-the-wall hot dog stand that will pour you an Oregon pint for $3.75.

There's a little bit of local-food action happening, with a couple of Zenner's sausages on the list, a different homemade soup each day, and a condiment table laden with an assortment of Beaver mustards. The number of sausage/topping options is truly bewildering, but most of them ring up to $5 or less. The people are friendly, they'll wait patiently while you figure it all out.

On the other hand, the beer list isn't bewildering at all. They only have four taps, but they're good ones, again with a local emphasis. On my first visit, when I saw the Lucky Lab tap handle and asked which beer it was, I was given a classic "Well, duh" look. "Super Dog, what else?" Good choice. Super Dog is one of my favorite Lab beers right now, a nice big IPA. Besides that, they always pour Laurelwood Free Range Red and -- representing the world outside of Oregon -- Anchor Steam.

The fourth tap is dedicated to Klamath Basin Brewing -- whoa, that's obscure. Extra community service points for that! For a long time SuperDog had Klamath's Cabin Fever Stout, which I kept meaning to try but somehow always ended up with a Super Dog. Last week the Klamath selection was Drop Dead Red, which is a smooth and easy red ale, more like a less-hoppy version of the Laurelwood than bigger reds like Roots or Lagunitas.

That's the story of the other Super Dog: it's a friendly place for a quick cheap bite if you're near the South Park Blocks, and you can't go wrong with any of the drafts. If you need to save an additional dollar, after 4 PM you get $1 off your beer when you also order a dog.

The Second-Oldest New Old Lompoc

Continuing our tour of close-in SE brewpubs, we come to the tiny but friendly Hedge House (warning: slooooow website) at 34th and Division. It's walking distance from my house, but just barely. More often I'm hitching up my bicycle to their industrial strength bike rack.

Back in the fall of 2003 we were really excited to read in the neighborhood newsletter that a New Old Lompoc pub was coming to the neighborhood. Being a newly-transplanted Portlander, I didn't have a long history with the original Lompoc on NW 23rd but the neighbors had only good things to say about it. I'd been in to try the hop-bomb C-Note IPA at least, and heard Dave's story about the keg of Lompoc beer with hop twigs still floating in it, so I was looking forward to having a New New Old Lompoc close by.

Somehow we never got the memo when it opened, and it seems like the first time I went in there was the next spring or summer. I asked, "When did you guys finally open?" and got a quizzical look. "Uh, January." Then again, they're not exactly screaming for attention, in an old house set way back from the street, with a small sign in the yard that gives little indication what line of business the house is in. I'm not even sure the sign was there for the first few months; I think you just had to know where it was.

Anyway, now we've found it, and the laid-back people and atmosphere make it a great place to pop in for a fresh beer, especially at lunchtime when it's less crowded. You might have to wait for a seat in the evenings, since the interior only seats about 25 people. There's more seating on the side patio, but only part of it is covered and heated. It's one of the more kid-friendly brewpubs in this part of town, since it's more like a restaurant than a bar, and has reasonable mac-and-cheese and sandwich choices for the young'uns.

The beer selection is much more limited than at the Lompoc flagship -- only 5 or 6 taps -- and they often seem to run out of the seasonals pretty quickly, though they had the Tavern Rat Barley Wine today, very nice. There's no cask engine, but usually either the Sockeye Cream Stout or the Lompoc Strong Draft is on nitro. A big variety would probably just be wasted on me anyway, since it's hard to talk myself into ordering anything but C-Note. Monday is cheap day, $2 pints. Well, Beervana says they're cheater pints, but at least they're cheap and good.

As for food, the sandwiches, soups, and salads are quite good. I especially like the Chop-Chop salad, it's a meal unto itself. Next door is the quaintly continental Pix Patisserie; if the beer selection at the Hedge House doesn't satisfy, Pix has a bunch of clever Belgians in bottles.

I called the Hedge House the "second-oldest" Lompoc, because they've added two more taverns to the family: the Fifth Quadrant Lompoc in North Portland, and the Oaks Bottom Public House down in Sellwood. They're all worth a visit -- particularly the Old New Old Lompoc in NW -- but the Hedge House will always be Home Sweet Home for us here in the southeast.

Set Sail for the Pilsner Room

Since the Hawthorne Bridge is the center of the Pub Night universe, it's about time I got around to writing about the Pilsner Room, the taproom for Full Sail's Portland brewery. After all, you can see the bridge from there, and it's a nice destination if you're on a bicycle, with easy access from Waterfront Park (which also means it's within stumbling distance of the Oregon Brewers Festival). I practically lived there last October because of brewer John Harris' magnificent Lupulin Fresh Hop Ale. So I'll take advantage of writing up Thursday night's tasting of barrel-aged porters and stouts to extol the virtues of the Pilsner Room.

The McCormick and Schmick's restaurant attached to the Pilsner Room provides a menu that's better than the usual pub fare, with good prices at lunch and super-cheap ones at happy hour. There are lots of 2- and 4-seat dining tables -- even more outside in good weather -- and plenty of room at the bar if you're on a solo mission or you just need to be close to the beer. The selection is fabulous: about 10 house brews, 3 cask engines, and another 10 guest taps. Besides the mainstream Full Sail repertoire -- and excellent seasonals like the Slipknot IPA -- there are always three or four rarities from the adjoining brewery, like the doppelbock, or the delicious Belgian dubbel. The guest taps are nicely done, with an interesting variety of quality beers. It always makes me happy to see an out-of-the-ordinary Hale's on tap -- it's the Wee Heavy right now. It's also sporting of them to always keep one of the engines stocked with a guest cask: a Double Mountain Red Ale was on cask Thursday, and I've seen Hopworks and (I think) Ninkasi casks.

Now, about those dark beers. Each year, the brewery takes a portion of their Top Sail Imperial Porter or Black Gold Imperial Stout, whichever they brewed that year, and ages it in bourbon barrels for nine or ten months. Thursday evening they trotted out three different examples: this year's aged Top Sail, a Black Gold from 2006, and a pre-Top Sail Imperial Porter from 2004. The year refers to when they were taken out of the oak, they were brewed the year before.

I don't know who started this scheme of aging stouts in bourbon casks, but it seems to be growing in popularity. My first encounter with it was a bourbon-aged KGB Stout that I had at Widmer's Gasthaus sometime in 2004. This year they're breaking out all over. John Foyston, the beer writer at the Oregonian, pointed out four different barrel-aged releases -- some stouts, some barleywines, some in whiskey barrels, some in wine -- in the space of a couple of weeks. And of course there's Epic and the infamous Abyss. Many of these are blends of aged and fresh beer. As far as I can tell from the Full Sail propaganda, the ones we had Thursday are just the straight-up aged item.

The usual Pub Nighters couldn't make the Full Sail matinee, so I was left on my own for this tasting. Fortunately, there was a friendly and sophisticated crowd sitting at the bar to ooh and ahh over the beers with. These were luscious, tasty brews. The 2004 porter tasted strongly of bourbon -- which could have turned out badly, but didn't. It also had a very strong chocolate taste, again, in a good way. The literature says it's 7.4% ABV; it tasted stronger than that to me, comparable to the 10% of the other two beers. I was pretty sure this was my favorite of the three, but the 2006 stout kept growing on me until I thought maybe that was my favorite. The 2006 was smooth and delicious, with that hint of minty flavor that so many good stouts have. Though the bourbon flavor wasn't as pronounced as with the 2004, it did add a nice touch to a very well-rounded beer. You can't really fault the 2008 porter for coming in third place to its accomplished older siblings. The flavor seemed milder than that of the 2004, and its lighter body made me think "cola". Still a mighty fine porter; I'm going to leave my bottle of it in the fridge for a while to see how it develops.

The Bistro at Higgins

Have you ever been in the right place at the right time? Not often enough? I can help you out. Sit yourself down at the bar at Higgins some lunchtime, or after work, and you'll know without a doubt that you're at the right place, at one of the many possible right times.

Now, Higgins Restaurant is a great place for one of those splurge dinners -- an anniversary divisible by five, a new job -- but the bistro side is reasonably-priced enough for less momentous occasions, such as lunch on a Thursday. The sandwich/salad lunch special is $8.50, and usually consists of some hormone-free meat on homemade bread with homemade pickles, with locally-grown vegetables on the side. If the special doesn't ring your bell, how about a burger from fresh-chopped sirloin, or a homemade pastrami sandwich? The appetizer mussels are a meal unto themselves. Vegetarian? There's a vegan soup every day.

Wait a minute, I thought this was a beer blog.

Let's talk about the beer at Higgins. The bottled beer list rivals their wine list, with an excellent selection of Belgians, and Belgian-y ales like Unibroue and Hair of the Dog.

The draft beer selection is not huge, but is carefully chosen. You know, Quality vs. Quantity. As seen in the picture above, there is always a cask-conditioned selection on the beer engine. Today it was Full Sail's delicious winter warmer Wreck the Halls; for the last few months Full Sail has tended to dominate the beer engine, but it was Deschutes for a few months before that.

There is always a Hair of the Dog selection on tap also. Usually -- like today -- it's a beer which is only available at Higgins: Hair of the Dog's Greg, named for chef/owner Greg Higgins. What was I saying about being in the right place at the right time? That's a pint of Greg in the picture above. The color is amber, but the style is like a strong Belgian Golden Ale: sweet, flowery, long and strong. Secret ingredient: winter squash prepared in the kitchen at Higgins, like the one pictured on top of the Greg tap-handle above. [Update: 2008/01/18: Whoa! Just had a Greg that was nothing like the one described here. Light in color, very flat, not sweet, not flowery, not long... A couple of weeks ago the Greg was from an older keg -- they had gone with Blue Dot instead of Greg for awhile -- but I also wonder if the current batch is not quite right. Not spoiled, but not right. New entry here.] [Update: 2008/03/27: Zowie! Had an awesome Greg today. When it's good, it's very, very good....]

Rotating selections favor local and/or seasonal brews. There's often a Roots or Laurelwood beer on tap, and this winter I've seen Terminal Gravity Fest, Hopworks Abominabale, and Deschutes Jubel; today it was Lucky Lab's Scottish Holiday, Elysian's Bifrost, and Sierra Nevada Celebration. The rest of the taps provide reasonable defaults to those customers who don't spend every waking moment considering their next Oregon beer: Guinness, Chimay, Lindeman's Framboise.

To top it all off, the service is friendly and efficient (both on the bistro side and the restaurant side). No snobbery at all, just the real deal, from food to beer to wine. So, whether you're after the uniqueness of Greg, or the heartiness of a cask Full Sail, or the outlandishness of some obscure De Dolle, pop into the bistro at Higgins and get the most from your Portland lifestyle.