Oregon Brewers Festival 2008

Now I remember why we usually skip weekends at the OBF. By 2 PM on Saturday, there was only room for one single-file line through the tents in either direction. By 3 PM the lines for the most popular beers had backed up to the tables and made a right angle to continue down the length of the tent. And though the atmosphere remained friendly, the balance was beginning to tip towards smug preppies who couldn't answer simple questions like, "What do you like so far?".

Even so, with a good crowd of neighbors, regulars, and out-of-town guests, we had a good time. Our Texas guests Clark and Milena had arranged their Portland visit to include the festival, so I was glad it wasn't 95 degrees in the shade like it is some years. Dave got to the festival a few minutes before the rest of us, quick enough to stake out a shady spot where we could roll out a couple blankets where the kids could sit and play between dust baths.

When we bailed out about 3:30, there were a few beers I would have liked to try that I missed because I didn't get to them before the lines went crazy: Iron Horse Quilter's Irish Death, Bell's Porter, Standing Stone Almond Brown, and Hale's Kolsch, to name a few. Of the ones I did try, here are my favorites:

• Lagunitas Hop Stoopid: awesome orangey smell and taste
• Green Flash Hop Head Red: grew on me Saturday, caramelly and nice
• Widmer Full Nelson: dark and syrupy, tangy grapefruit
• Russian River Pliny the Elder: delish, of course
• Boundary Bay Dry Hopped Pale: tasty
• Roots Calypso: refreshing, light, spicy
• Rock Bottom Congo Queen: tasty, fruity Belgian
• Surly Coffee Bender: strong coffee, tasty

Jeff at Beervana thought the Widmer tasted like "cat pee" -- I can see what he's talking about, but I liked it anyway. Most of my friends disagreed with me. The roots Calypso has Scotch Bonnet peppers (a.k.a. Habanero), one of my favorite flavors in the world. In the past they've done a Chocolate Habanero Stout, which was good, but I think the peppers go even better with this really light beer. I'll be enjoying that while it lasts at the pub.

All in all, another enjoyable brewfest. I think I'll stick to the weekdays next year.

First Glance at the 21st OBF

Our big day at the Oregon Brewers Festival 2008 will be tomorrow, to accomodate out-of-town guests and tyrannical work schedules. But I popped in this afternoon, ostensibly just to buy mugs for a head start tomorrow, and ended up spending a little longer there than I planned. I love the OBF. I know it doesn't have the beer-nerd cred of other festivals, but the location and the vibe are so good that it's really a highlight of the summer for me.

Part of the reason I lingered a while was because I met Matt, on assignment from My Beer Pix and acting as a stunt double for Port Brewing's Tomme Arthur. Not a dead ringer, but he was wearing a Lost Abbey shirt. While Matt and I were chatting, Brian with the pointy mustache walked up -- like my friends Cathy and Loren, it's getting to the point where I expect to see him at every beer festival I go to.

Here are the 5 beers I tried during my short stay:

• Oakshire (née Willamette) Amber: Drinkable, but not as exciting as their IPA from the Brewers Dinner or their Dunkelweisse from the NAOBF.
• Green Flash Hop Head Red: Tasty big red ale, with tongue-coating amounts of hops. Possibly too hoppy.
• Rogue Glen: Named for the late Glen Hay Falconer, a classic strong Rogue Ale. My Friday favorite.
• Flying Fish Abbey Double: well-done Abbey Ale, on the esthery side. New Jersey? Get a rope!
  
• New Holland Dragon's Milk Oak-aged Strong Ale: Chocolatey, not bad, but not as big as its hype.

I'll have more to post after our big day tomorrow. Have fun!

Live from the Brewers Dinner

The Brewers Dinner, annual benefit for the Oregon Brewers Guild, is a fun kickoff to the Brewers Festival.

Some highlights: Rogue Imperial YSB, Oakshire (formerly Willamette) IPA, Bridgeport Hop Czar from the firkin.

Good times, have fun at the OBF!

Portland International Beerfest 2008

The weather was beautiful last weekend for the Portland International Beerfest -- very pleasant compared to the heat wave during the Organic Brewers Festival a few weeks ago. Even if had been as hot as that, the location helps a lot: there are eight or nine huge trees in the block where PIB is held, as opposed to the single tree that adorns the 12 acres at Overlook Park.

On Friday night the pleasant breeze helped clear out the cigar smoke that so oppressed another blogger on Saturday. It's true, there were an astounding number of cigars being smoked, and lots of dogs, but children weren't allowed this year. I'm not much on prohibiting kids from beer festivals, but given the small space and the large crowd at the PIB this year, I think it worked out for the best.

I mentioned before that the Jolly Pumpkin Oro de Calabaza was the standout beer for me -- the one I'd never had that really impressed. After reading Jeff's account of the Harviestoun Ola Dubh Stout aged in Highland Park whisky casks, I'm embarrassed that I was too stingy to spend the $4 for a taste of it. Chalk it up to my experience last year with the J.W. Lee's barleywine aged in Lagavulin casks: it sounded wonderful but was such a disappointment that I was afraid the Ola Dubh would let me down in the same way.

Here are some other beers that made a good impression:

• Rogue Brewer's Ale: very nice dark, strong ale, reminded me of Lucky Lab's Old Yeller barleywine
• Rochefort 8: awesome dark Belgian ale
• Rogue Batch 10,000: delicious barleywine
• Abbaye Des Rocs Gran Cru: sweet, orange-blossom honey flavor
• Dogfish Head Burton Baton IIPA: not bad, brown sugar flavor
• De Koningshoeven Quadruple: nice quad, bubblegummy
• Baird Temple Garden Yuzu Ale (Japanese beer with fruit): interesting
• Mahr's Weissebock: nice, rich
• Allagash Black: nice, but a little thin

The Allagash Black was listed as a "Foreign Stout", which made me think it would be like the unusual and delicious stout from de Dolle. It wasn't bad, but didn't stack up to my expectations. I was discussing it with a stranger while waiting in line for something else; in his opinion it should really be compared to Brussels black ales, like New Belgium's 1554. Sadly, I never got back around to the Allagash tent for a sample of Curieux, their barrel-aged Tripel, but I can heartily recommend it based on previous experience.

Wow, googling around for a website for Mahr's, I stumbled upon my own notes from last year's PIB, on Lee's blog. I had forgotten that he published them. Just another reminder of what a good time the PIB is -- yet another reason not to leave Portland during July.

Live from PIB 2008

In a few days I'll do a recap of the 2008 Portland International Brewfest, but today I'm experimenting with posting live via cell phone.

Each year it seems like there is one beer at the PIB that sticks in my mind. Something I never had before that really opens my eyes. Last year it was Eel River Triple Exultation; a couple years ago it was de Dolle's Belgian Stout. What will it be for 2008?

And the answer is... Jolly Pumpkin Oro de Calabaza. Dry and yeasty, just delicious.

Go to the festival, have a good time!

Organic Brewers Festival 2008

Hot! That's my main impression of Saturday's session of the North American Organic Brewers Festival, and of the bike ride back home. It doesn't hit 100° very often in Portland: lucky thing there is one tree remaining in Overlook Park. It was pretty big, too, I don't know how the woodmen missed it. It provided enough shade for every single festival goer to cower beneath it between trips to the beer tent.

This was the first year I've attended the NAOBF, despite years of good intentions. I noticed that a couple of Portland bloggers list the Organic Festival as their favorite -- well, the word Jeff used was "premier" -- and although I had a good time, I can't say I feel the same way. Maybe without the crippling heat; or in a more scenic location. I should be careful what I wish for... Brett was telling me that they had the opposite weather problem last year -- too rainy.

I did totally approve of the alphabetical ordering of the brewery stations. A friend of mine taught me this useful saying: "There are exactly two kinds of order in the world: alphabetical order and random order." Please remember that next time you organize a beer festival! Dave noticed it right away, and it was certainly a big help in navigating the festival.

Dave and Brett and I were swapping tastes around, but we still kept the samples to a relatively small number. There were quite a few beers that I wanted to try but ended up skipping, plus a couple on my wish-list that were out by the time I got around to them. I kept my usual inarticulate notes on the beers I tasted, but didn't try to rank them like I occasionally do. Here are a few highlights (in random order):

• Eel River Triple Exultation Old Ale: "awesome". The brewery calls this the "Ozzy Osbourne of Old Ales" -- they should cross-market with Off the Rail.
  
• Eel River IPA: "good... no, bad... no, good!". There was so much flavor in this beer that it sometimes rubbed me the wrong way. I need to try a whole pint.
• Laurelwood Green Mammoth IPA: "very tasty". Laurelwood is at their best when they go big.
  
• Fort George Quick Wit: "very nice".
• Hair of the Dog Blue Dot Double IPA: "oh yeah".
• Willamette Dunkel: "very nice". This was a spot-on dark hefeweizen. Cloudy, fruity, and delicious.
• Sasquatch Legacy Project Imperial Vienna: "nice". Very refreshing, which is amazing for an 8.7% lager.
• Crannog Ales Hell's Kitchen: "nice". British Columbia brewery. They say this is an "Irish Red Ale made with organic potatoes". It was smooth and tasty.

I mentioned a few months ago that I had seen Willamette Brewing's unfiltered Amber on tap at the Pizzicato Pizza at the airport, but I didn't get a chance to try it then. The Dunkel was wonderful, and the IPA they had at the NAOBF was also good; keep an eye out for their beer around town. Belmont Station has bottles of some Eel River offerings -- I know I've picked up Triple Exultation before -- and it I think I've seen rotating taps for them in Portland a couple times, but nothing steady that I know of.

Overlook Park actually wasn't too bad of a bike ride from the east side. Just connect up with the Interstate bike lane from the Esplanade near the Rose Garden. Hopefully next year it won't be 100 degrees out.

Oregon Brewers Festival and Nearby Attractions

Synchronized blogging! It's The Session. This month's topic is beer festivals, so I feel obliged to write something about the Oregon Brewers Festival. The 2008 festival is July 24-July 27 -- it's always the last weekend in July, a highlight of the Portland beer calendar. What I have to say is probably old hat for locals, but I wanted to take advantage of The Session to introduce the OBF and Portland to out-of-towners.

Each of the 70-or-so breweries represented at the festival brings a single beer. The brewers seem to take one of three strategies in choosing which beer to exhibit:

1. Light and easy-drinking: for warm weather and neophytes.
2. Wild, one-off experiment: to keep the geeks interested.
3. Tried-and-true slam-dunk: to show off your brewing dominance.
   

The first category is exemplified by 21st Amendment, and the ridiculous Watermelon Wheat they show up with year in and year out. Category 2 experimenters include Stone and Widmer, cranking out something special or unusual for the festival each year, which can be hit or miss. For example, I loved Widmer's Imperial Wit last year (many people disagreed), but their sorghum/tapioca beer in 2006 was lame. Finally, a few brewers take the chest-thumping approach, like Russian River, bringing Pliny the Elder every time, which ratebeer says is in the 100th percentile. It's better than 100% of all beers -- it's even better than itself!

Because of strategies 1 and 2, not every beer is going to bowl you over. That's OK, because what makes the OBF special is not so much all the different beers, but rather the mellow, friendly vibe. Maybe the beer has something to do with that. The crowd also tends to have more women than you would expect at a beer festival -- I remember being struck by it when I first went in 2003, thinking "Hey, it's not just a bunch of old, fat guys". We even bring kids to the festival -- draft root beer is one of the bribes that makes that possible.

That pretty much sums it up about the OBF: relaxed atmosphere, lotsa beers. So for the rest of this article, I'd like to give you some ideas for Portland points of interest within walking distance of the festival. After all, you may want to get out of the chain-link fence for a bit, either to pace yourself, or to do some more in-depth beer research.

The Journey is the Destination

The OBF's location at Tom McCall Waterfront Park makes for a nice 2.5 mile loop along the east and west banks of the Willamette River, walking over or under four of Portland's drawbridges. Go south along the river, beneath the Morrison Bridge, and cross the Willamette (rhymes with "dammit", by the way) on the beautiful Hawthorne Bridge (1910). Pedestrians should keep toward the bridge railing -- bicycles get the part of the sidewalk nearest the cars. Follow the curving sidewalk down to the path on the east side of the river, the Eastbank Esplanade.


View Larger Map

Heading north along the river, accompanied by the automotive roar of I-5 overhead, you'll cross under the Morrison and Burnside Bridges before coming to a stretch of the sidewalk which actually floats in the Willamette. You'll cross the river back to Waterfront Park on the Steel Bridge (1914). There are other double-deck drawbridges in the world, but the Steel Bridge is the only one that telescopes: the lower deck can be raised while the upper deck remains open to traffic.

For Kids of All Ages

If you brought your kids to the festival and need to give them a break, the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI) is a science museum on the east side of the river, just south of the Hawthorne Bridge, easily accessible from the Esplanade. There is also an IMAX theater and planetarium at OMSI.

Another interesting eastside youth attraction is the skateboard park hidden under the Burnside Bridge. Originally a do-it-yourself project that was later embraced by the city, you can't get to it directly from the pedestrian loop described above -- you can't even see it from there. You have to get onto the south sidewalk of the Burnside Bridge, either on the west side at Saturday Market, or by taking the stairs labeled "Burnside" from the Esplanade. Follow the Burnside sidewalk to MLK, turn right and go a block to Ankeny, turn right and go two blocks to 2nd (the sidewalk runs out), and turn right again to go under the bridge. You probably shouldn't go down there at night, but it's a cool thing to see during the day.

More Beer!

There are several interesting brewpub options you can walk to from the festival.

The Full Sail Pilsner Room [review] is about 3/4 mile south of the festival. Go underneath the Hawthorne Bridge and follow the sidewalk down towards the sailboat harbor.

Tugboat Brewing Company [review] is about 1/2 mile west of the festival. Follow Oak St. across Broadway, Tugboat is one block to your right.

The Oregon outpost of Rock Bottom is about 1/4 mile southwest of the festival at 2nd and Morrison.

If you took the stroll to the east side of the river, you're only about a half-mile from Roots [review] at 7th and Hawthorne, the Lucky Labrador [review] at 9th and Hawthorne, and the Green Dragon [review] at 9th and Yamhill.

Further Afield

This article is too long already, so I'll briefly list a few more attractions that you should see while you're in Portland.

• Portland Aerial Tram: our answer to the monorail.
• Horse Brass Pub [review]: a national treasure.
• International Rose Test Garden: flowers and vistas.
• Ladd's Addition Rose Gardens: short walk from the Lucky Lab.
  

The Horse Brass would be quite a long walk: take bus #15 (to Parkrose) and get off near SE 45th. The Tram is not too long of a walk if you're already at the Pilsner Room, but it's not a very pleasant one; you could also take the streetcar.

That's my take on the Oregon Brewers Festival, and some things to do nearby if you're a tourist. Thanks to Thomas for hosting this Session!

Cheers to Belgian Beers 2008

Roots hosted the 2nd Annual Cheers to Belgian Beers event Saturday, a kind of friendly competition where area brewers all brew a Belgian-style beer with the same strain of yeast. Proceeds from the festival go to charity; the public votes on their favorite beer, and the winner of that People's Choice Award hosts next year's Cheers and picks the charities.

There was such a crowd that the commemorative glasses were gone within an hour, and by the time Carla, Dave, Jill and I got there about 3 hours after the start, a couple of kegs were dry -- New Old Lompoc split their entry between two smallish kegs. Roots had room for the crowd because they're in the process of expanding into the back part of their building. All the brewing operation will move into the area in the picture here, freeing up more pub room by the front door.

It seemed to me a little overwhelming to try and make sense of 14 different Belgian-style ales all at once. Usually, the more beers on the list the happier I am, so maybe it was just the mood I was in. Or maybe it's the mystique: beers perfected by monks cloistered in remote abbeys, flavored with secret yeasts and spices, aged just so... shouldn't each one be savored -- from a specially designed glass -- and ruminated over?

There was no time for rumination, but there were some mighty fine beers on hand. I had already tried Full Sail's Dubbel, Hopworks' El Diablo, and Lompoc's Mon Cheri. El Diablo is magnificent, and I really enjoy the Full Sail (on tap the last few months at the Pilsner Room), so I was pleasantly surprised to find a few other beers that I liked at least as much as those two. My favorites were:

• Lucky Labrador: Malt Bomb Belgian (Belgian Dark Abbey): total sweetness
• Rock Bottom: Floreal Deux (Spiced Amber): nice and even
• McMenamins' CPR: Blind Abbot (Belgian Dubbel): classic Abbey
• Hopworks: El Diablo (Belgian Golden Strong): Carla says sweet and sharp
• Full Sail: Dubbel (Belgian Dubbel): very good
• Roots: Farmhouse Bruin (Belgian Brown): decent, tangy
  

My sources tell me that the Malt Bomb won the People's Choice award. I know it got half the votes at our table. It was a pretty eccentric brew -- I'm not sure the monks would recognize it -- but the extreme richness of it went well with the yeasty flavor. When I stopped the Lab's Dave Fleming to compliment him on it, he told me it was brewed by Abby Sherrill at the Hawthorne Lab -- hey, it's Abby's Abbey Ale. He also said "That's one expensive beer," alluding to the amount of malt that went into it. It's a beautiful mahogany color: check out the picture on the left. I picked up a growler of it at the Lab today; if you're lucky it might still be on tap.

Rock Bottom's entry was very tasty, as was Corey Blodgett's Blind Abbot, which got some of its flavor from carmelized raisins added to the mix. A couple of the beers I think got short-changed by the small-quick-taste format of the event: I know the Full Sail didn't taste as good to me as it does when I get to linger over a pint, and I think I need to spend more time getting to know the Roots Bruin. A couple of other beers are worth mentioning. BJ's Redrum Belgian Red Ale was pretty nice. And if you like really sour beers -- I don't -- Philadelphia's Flemish Brown seemed well done for that style.

For a second opinion, check out Jeff Alworth's review on Beervana. Our favorites overlap on the Full Sail and the Roots, and although the Laurelwood Saison d'Arduinna didn't grab me like it did him, there was nothing bad about it. But I'm scratching my head about Jeff's choice of Widmer's Belgian Golden. I'm usually a big Widmer booster, but this one left me flat. At our table, Dave pretty much summed it up with "it tastes like beer" -- there didn't seem to be much more to it than that. On the other hand, maybe it was just a casualty of so many great beers in so many tiny glasses. Many thanks to Roots for putting on a great tasting.

[Update: 2008/04/09]: The People's Choice winners have been announced! With 289 ballots counted, Lucky Lab Malt Bomb was the winner. Laurelwood Saison d'Arduinna, 2nd; Alameda Lucky Devil 3rd. Congratulations!

Cask Beers at the Horsebrass

Carla makes me take my clothes off and leave them on the side porch whenever I come home from the Horsebrass. Then I dash naked to the shower, and scrub myself from head to toe. I don't even take off my glasses, because if I don't wash them with soap, I spend the next couple days sniffing around trying to figure out what part of my body or clothing I failed to purge of cigarette smoke.

Despite the unbreathable air, the Horsebrass is a national treasure. A beautiful standing beer list, plus a dozen or so well-chosen rotating taps, usually including three cask conditioned ales. Five dartboards, authentic pub grub, a Rogue beer named after the proprietor's brother (Younger's Special Bitter).... It's worth an occasional brush with lung cancer to bask in such pub glory. This weekend's cask festival was a great excuse to brave the smoke at the Horsebrass. Dave and I headed down there Friday evening; we sat down with Brian, a mustachioed chap that I seem to run into at all of these festivals nowadays. Matias joined us a little later.

The Horsebrass published a list of 21 cask beers, so it was a little disappointing to arrive and find that only 6 of them were available at a time. Not that we were going to run the table with 10-ounce sample sizes, but six cask-conditioned beers felt a little paltry considering that any day of the week you can walk in and find three cask selections. Oh well. The ones we were able to try were tasty indeed:

• Walking Man: Big Phat Homo Erectus Double IPA: awesome, sweet, hoppy
• Double Mountain: Oak-Aged India Red Ale: sweet and nice, honey-flavored
• Laurelwood: Deranger Imperial Red Ale: sweet, thick, hoppy
• Hopworks: Deluxe Old Ale: very nice, nicer than CO2
• Bridgeport: Hop Harvest Imperial IPA: good, but still too much dry hops
• Deschutes: Jubel Ale: subdued, caramely

A word of explanation on Hopworks and Bridgeport. I've had the Hopworks DOA on regular draft at Higgins a couple of times: it's a nice strong ale, much more malty than hoppy. It's always good, but this cask version was even better. As for the Bridgeport, it's really a fine brew, but I can't suppress my disappointment that the fresh hops are completely dominated by the dry hops in the flavor. This goes back to my fresh hop obsession from last fall. The Bridgeport was served firkin-style -- that is, the beer wasn't pumped out, it just poured out from a spigot. The Walking Man may have been done the same way. I didn't see a huge difference between them and the hand-pumped ales; I'm not sure firkins are something to get especially worked up about.

What about the beers we missed? It was quite a blow not to get to try Lagunitas Maximus or Hairy Eyeball on cask (especially for Dave), and I wanted to get a taste of Ft. George's Cavatica Bourbon Barrel Stout, which I've had on CO2 at the Green Dragon. The promised Ninkasi selections were part of the attraction for me, but at least I've been fortunate enough to have Tricerahops and Believer on cask at the Horsebrass in the past. Even so, I'm sad to have missed them, especially since the Tricerahops lined up for the fest appears to be a special dry-hopped version. I also would have liked to try Dick's Porter or Barley Wine on cask, and the Mt. Hood Pittock Wee Heavy. Mt. Hood Brewing always surprises me with the quality of their beers, though the last time I tried their Wee Heavy -- at the Horsebrass, of course -- it wasn't exactly what I hoped for.

All in all, another great pub night with some one-of-a-kind beers. Don your oxygen masks, and go forth to the Horsebrass!

Barleywine Festival 2008

Dave and I beat the rush yesterday and showed up right at the opening of the Lucky Lab's Barleywine and Big Beer Festival. That made it a much more relaxed tasting than last year's -- no waiting in line, no shortages, and a chance to shoot the breeze with the brewers and other diehards. The Quimby Street pub was mostly empty. Many of the patrons were just there for lunch and hardly seemed to notice the treasure trove of gigantic beers available to them.

I had been eagerly anticipating another shot at the Caldera Russian Imperial Stout. It didn't disappoint: the 2005 was delicious, with some kind of nutmeg flavor to it; the 2004 (according to the taps -- the menu said 2003) reminded me in a good way of this year's barrel-aged Top Sail. The texture was really interesting on the 2004 -- lots of tiny bubbles, almost like nitro bubbles, but fizzier -- whereas the 2005 had almost no carbonation. No matter, the 2005 was just beautiful, one of my top 3 for the day. Dave described it as "chocolate steak milkshake". Neither one of us is really ready to write for Wine Spectator. If you ever see this on tap someplace, please leave a comment.

My very favorite beer of the day was Terminal Gravity's 2005 Barleywine. It was unmistakably a barleywine, plus an extra helping of floral hops. The hops were balanced with just the right amount of sweetness, and there was a good wallop of medicine in there too: 13.1% ABV. It was a beautiful thing.

A nice surprise was the Fort George 2007 Sistine Chapel Imperial IPA. This got listed on the "big beer" side of the menu because of its name, but it looked like a barleywine, and smelled like a barleywine, and tasted just exactly like a barleywine, so let's call it a barleywine. I can see the temptation to call it an IPA, because it was very hoppy, but it was hardly alone in that regard. The Chapel has a very beautiful perfumed hop flavor that went well with the strength and sweetness. 2007 was a great year for new breweries in Oregon: Fort George is definitely one to keep an eye on. Makes me want to head out to Astoria.

On the flip-side of the Barleywine/IPA coin, Full Sail's Old Boardhead was definitely more like an IPA than a barleywine. There was something really strange about this beer: at first it was one of the best, but it got worse as it warmed up, which is not the way things usually work for me. First taste, it was very hoppy: flowery hops at first, becoming bitter for a nice long finish. Later, there was only a kind of dry bitterness, and the long finish was more like a bad aftertaste. Moral: drink it fast.

There were quite a few beers that we didn't get around to, and a few that hadn't been tapped yet. Of the ones we tried, here are my notes on the ones I liked, in order of preference (though the Full Sail would have ranked 4th if the flavor had held up):

• Terminal Gravity: 2005 Barleywine: floral, balanced with sweet
• Caldera: 2005 Russian Imperial Stout: nutmeg, delicious, flat
• Fort George: 2007 Sistine Chapel IIPA: barleywine-ish, nice floral hops
• Caldera: 2004 Russian Imperial Stout: lots of tiny bubbles; like Top Sail
• Lucky Lab: 2005 Old Yeller: maple, bitter and good, better and better
• Deschutes: 2005 Mirror-Mirror: stronger? [than listed 9.2%], tasty
• Walking Man: 2007 Old Stumblefoot: good, sweet and bitter
• Sierra Nevada: 2004 Bigfoot: nicely done
• Lucky Lab: 2002 Old Yeller: maple, a little funky
• Rogue: 2004 Old Crustacean: super hoppy, nice
• Great Divide: 2007 Old Ruffian: so-so at first, gets better as it warms, quite nice
• Stone: 2006 Old Guardian: purty good
• Full Sail: 2006 Old Boardhead: hoppy, flower becoming bitter; warming up didn't help
  

I'll mention a couple of oddities that didn't make it into the rankings. New Old Lompoc sent over a 1998 Tavern Rat -- yes, 10 years old. You know, it tasted pretty good for being that old, though it was totally flat. It really looked like a glass of sherried whisky, like a Macallan cask strength. I also tried something from a brewery I'd never heard of before, located in a town I'd never heard of before: Laht Neppur, from Waitsburg, WA. Their 2006 Barleywine wasn't quite up to the competition, but I'll definitely check out their pub if I ever find myself out Walla Walla way.

McMenamins' Battle of the Belt 2008

A bunch of the Pub Nighters turned out Saturday to the McMenamins' Hillsdale Pub (photo lifted from McMenamins' website) to cheer on our local boy, Corey Blodgett, in the Battle of the Belt. The Battle of the Belt is an internal competition to decide which brewer will represent McMenamins' at the Oregon Brewers' Festival. Corey is local in the sense that he lives in the neighborhood and runs with the Pub Night crowd, but the Cornelius Pass Roadhouse where he brews is so far from my stomping grounds that I rarely get any of his beers. One saving grace is that the CPR's tied house in town is the McMenamins' on Broadway, not that far away. But they don't always get his very coolest beers, like the oak-aged Double Red Ale that I got to try over the weekend, thanks to Brett, who snagged me a taste from the roadhouse. The Double Red was very nice, compares really well to Ninkasi's Believer. I like that style a lot.

Every year, there's been some conflict that kept me from going to the Battle of the Belt. So I was very happy this year that Carla and I got to hitch a ride with Dave and Jill and little baby Vaughn and cast a vote for Corey, not to mention actually taste some of his beer. Corey and fellow CPR brewer Chris Oslin's entry was "Rose City 'Til I DiePA" -- maybe work on those beer names, guys -- which was a delicious IIPA made with organic malt. Just one kind of malt, does that make it a single malt? Consulting my notes here... "awesome IPA". Well, that's my usual way with words for these things. I can expand a little by saying that it was very well-balanced, hoppy without getting too bitter. Smooth and strong.

You get to vote on three beers at the battle, and my other two votes went to High Street's Schneeflocken (notes: Belgian tripley, good), and Lighthouse ORator (notes: bourbony, good). Hmmm, looking back over the program, those are strange comments on those beers, since the ORator doppelbock didn't have anything to do with bourbon, and the Schneeflocken was a Dunkel Weisse, more Alpine than Low Country. Harry Sanger was the brewer of the ORator and Lane Fricke was the Schneeflocken brewer.

We were impressed at how many good beers were poured at the battle. There were some completely bad ones -- we debated which toilet cleanser one of them tasted most like -- and there were some that were too, well, McMenamins'-flavored. But some of them were really good:

• Dad Watson's Pale Rider (American Pale, by Brian Lawrence): nicely bitter
• Fulton Old 32 (NW Strong, by Chris Haslett): good & strong
• Roseburg Station 'M' (Strong Ale, by Tom Johnson): maltily good
• Hillsdale Madman Jack's (Insane Pale Ale, by Matt Carter): good IPA
• Oak Hills My Favorite Things (NW Pale, by John Keane): good & very hoppy

The name "Pale Rider" brings back old Austin memories. Celis briefly made a Pale Rider Ale in collaboration with Clint Eastwood, with proceeds donated to charity. Hilarious advertising slogan: "You didn't expect Clint Eastwood to make a salad dressing, did you?". The Dad Watson's definitely has a 2008 Northwest flavor instead of a 1998 Texas one.

Another highlight was meeting Corey's dad Walt, who flew in from Milwaukee for the festivities. For whatever reason, the winner of the Battle of the Belt won't be announced for a few more days. A good time was had by all, and I hope to make it back next year.

Update [2008/02/25]: McMenamins' finally announced the winners: Hillsdale 1st place, CPR 2nd place, Fulton 3rd place. Sounds like a home-field advantage to me, but there's no denying that the three winners were excellent ales. Congratulations to the brewers!

Barleywine Notes from Last Year

Going through a bunch of paperwork and mail that had piled up on my desk for a year or so, I found the program from 2007's Barleywine and Big Beer Fest at the Lucky Lab. Actually the program calls it a "Tastival". Let's hope people stop using that word this year. I wasn't blogging at the time, but I scribbled my usual short and incoherent notes on the program. It's alarming how many of these huge beers I claim to have tasted -- we must have been sharing sips around the table, which I think consisted of Lindsey, Corey, Brett, and me.

Anyway, since this year's Ta... Festival is about a month away, and since I was just gushing about Old Yeller, it was interesting to look at the old notes. Indeed, Old Yeller seems to have been a favorite, given these remarks:

• Lucky Lab: 2002 Old Yeller: Textbook. Nice.
  
• Lucky Lab: 2004 Old Yeller: Better. Coffee/Chocolate.
• ...
  
• Terminal Gravity: 2005 Barleywine: Best so far. Oops, Lucky Lab better.

But it looks like I changed my mind at least one more time. The only entry I put a star beside was:

• Rogue: 2004 Old Crustacean: Good stuff. Hops & brown sugar.

I'm guessing the star means it was my favorite, but there's no guarantee. In fact, my memory was that the Pelican Grand Cru was the beer that impressed me the most that day. Other beers that made a favorable impression were:

• Anderson Valley: 2006 Beer of the Horn: Yes. But very sweet.
• Raccoon Lodge: 2005 Barrel-Aged Old Yarleywine: Good. [Crossed out: "Textbook."]
• Sierra Nevada: 2004 Bigfoot: Nice hoppy.
• Sierra Nevada: 2005 Bigfoot: Ditto.
• Tuck's: 2005 Glutius Maximus Barleywine: Good.
• Caldera: 2003 Russian Imperial Stout: Good times.
• Caldera: 2005 Russian Imperial Stout: Better times. Spiced.
• Lagunitas: 2005 Brown Shugga: Better than fresh.
• Pelican: 2006 Grand Cru: Very nice. Dark color. Tasty.

Mmmm... Caldera. As we were sipping Abyss last week, Dave and I were reminiscing about Caldera Imperial Stout. Sometime in 2004 we discovered that delicious thing on tap at William's on 12th, a bistro in the neighborhood that has since closed down. It was the first I'd heard of Caldera, but what a great way to get introduced. The imperial stout was so delicious, pitch black, with a big, dark head. Anyway, the other day we were trying to remember how well it would compare with Abyss -- pretty well, I suspect. A couple years of it are on the list for this year's Festival, I can't wait to refresh my memory.

Holiday Ale Festival 2007

Only about two weeks late, I wanted to capture my thoughts on this year's Holiday Ale Festival in Portland. That's my neighbor, Jill, enjoying the festivities with Santa Claus.

Carla and I got there pretty close to opening time on Thursday, before everyone got all cheek-by-jowl and belly-to-belly, and we had a great time. I went back Friday afternoon to fill in a few gaps and hang out with the neighbors, but the crowd was so dense at that point that it was a little less enjoyable. Still a good vibe, just too much of it.

The notes I take at these festivals are telegraphic, to say the least, usually three words or less for each beer. Not Pulitzer Prize-winning words, either; sometimes just a "Nah", or an "Awesome" -- which is all I could think of to say about my favorite from Thursday, a blend of Hair of the Dog beers called Jim II. On Thursday I had the presence of mind to keep a ranking of my favorites, which were:

• Hair of the Dog: Jim II (Specialty Blend): "Awesome".
• Double Mountain: Fa La La La La (Winter Ale): "Most excellent, hoppy & big".
• Caldera: Cauldron Brew '07 (Dry-Hopped Strong Ale): "Carla says almost perfect. Flat carbonation, tasty".
• New Old Lompoc: Brewdolph (Belgian Specialty): "Really good, candy".
• Ninkasi: Otis (Oatmeal Stout): "Delicious".
• Deschutes: 2007 Oak-Aged Jubel (Winter Warmer): "Not disappointing".

Hmmm... Where would that Jubel fit in the ratings of the 5-year vertical described in an earlier entry? It might have been slightly better than the regular 2007 -- which I like a lot -- then again, how much greatness can you get from aging in oak for only 2 months?

I skipped Roots' Festivus and Full Sail's Wreck the Halls at the festival, since I've already "sampled" them this year. They probably would have landed somewhere around New Old Lompoc in the rankings above. They're awesome beers.

Hey, is Ninkasi trying to make fun of Hair of the Dog, giving their beer a man's name with only four letters in it? Speaking of which, what's with HotD's "Jim"? I'm surprised they didn't keep up the four-letter pattern by calling it Jimi.

Now for some notes from Friday. These aren't as -- ahem -- scientific as the ones above, but there are some beers worth mentioning, though they're not listed in order of preference like the ones above. For the simple reason that I can't remember that order.

• Lagunitas: Oaked Brown Shugga (Strong Ale): "Awesome". My poetry shines through again.
• Hopworks: Organic Kentucky Christmas (Winter Ale): "Quite good".
• Rogue: Santa's Private Reserve (Double-hopped Red Ale): "Quite good". The language skills are really breaking down at this point.
• Pyramid: Dry-hopped Snow Cap (Winter Ale): "Very good, flavorful". It's easy for us snobs to dismiss Pyramid beers, but I like Snow Cap pretty well.
• Pelican: Bad Santa (Black IPA): "Really good, like rauchbier".
• Sierra Nevada: 20th Street Ale (Fresh Hop Ale!): "Better than the Harvest Ale. Malty and full."

I was glad to get that 20th Street, it was a last shot at fresh hops, in a year when I went off the deep end. (Actually, Matias gave me some bottles of his homegrown, homebrew fresh hop, so it hasn't ended yet!) I didn't care for Sierra Nevada's Harvest Ale this year, but the 20th Street was a special batch, with hops from their own garden. It just seemed fuller and better, with more of the fresh hop aroma.

There were some other pretty good beers, and there were five of them that I had to put in the dungeon. Since the internet is forever, I don't want to name names, but I can at least share the comments for the bad ones:

• "Nah". But I already told you that one.
• "A little disappointing". This is a winter beer I usually like.
• "No way, tainted".
• "Not too long. A little bland, but bitter". Ouch. Bitter usually means good for me.
• "Not so good".

Man, all this writing makes me thirsty.