Meet Mt. Tabor Brewing

Another couple of nano-brewers have been subjected to my poor cellphone photography skills.  That's Eric and Brian of Mt. Tabor Brewing, who brought a record-setting four varieties of their beer to the Beermongers for a meet-the-brewer event Wednesday evening.  I had never tried any of their beers, so I was pleased to get to sample their Asylum Avenue IPA, Tabor Special Bitter, Calf Stout, and Soapbox Blonde.

My favorite was the TSB, lighter in color than what I'd expect from an ESB, but a nice quaffable ale with a mild fruitiness and restrained hopping.  I love hops, but there's a time and a place for them, and it's nice to have a bitter that's not too bitter.  On the other end of the hop spectrum, their Calf Stout had tons of hops -- Eric said that it has a theoretical 128 IBUs -- but maintains its stouty balance.  Interesting beer: it's the second run from a Russian Imperial Stout they brewed, and still clocks in at 5.3%.  Nice job with the Reduce/Reuse/Recycle.  It's not a milk stout -- the "calf" had people asking -- they call it that because its imperial Papa is called Sibeerian Bull Stout.  I liked the Calf Stout a lot.

Mt. Tabor beers are rare enough that -- as I said -- this was my first sample of them.  So where can you find them?

• Canton Grill (SE 82nd and Division) -- Chinese-American restaurant run by Brian's in-laws
• Vintage Cocktail Lounge (SE 79th and Stark) -- always has 2 or 3 taps from MTB.
• The Farm Cafe (SE 7th and Burnside) -- locavore food place that usually has a Mt. Tabor tap

The brewers mentioned that the Beermongers keg of the Calf was the offspring of a custom order of the imperial stout that a fan ordered for his wedding.  That's the stage Mt. Tabor is at right now -- if you want a custom brew for a special occasion, call them up and they're likely to make you a deal.

Cheers to Beermongers and Brewpublic for arranging this meet-the-brewer.  And don't forget to support your local nano.

Beetje Brewery

Apparently there is another small brewery about to open in Portland: Beetje Brewery has been approved by the TTB to start brewing on its one-barrel garage system. Oh, you haven't heard of Beetje? Neither had I, until I noticed a comment that Jeff left on the New School a few weeks ago. "Beetje" is Flemish for small -- sounds like we have a Belgian-oriented brewery here. Here's a cartoon that explains how it got rolling:



The owner, Mike Wright, says that he hopes to be running by late summer or early fall, but he has a family and a day job, so the schedule might vary. Here's his plan:

I will definitely self-distribute and hope to get into a couple of local SE bars/restaurants. There's no money in kegs at my scale so, I am interested in exploring bottles. Not only from a financial perspective. But I like bottle conditioning some of my beers.

That's kind of the opposite of other nano-brewery strategies: Vertigo, Mt. Tabor, and Natian are strictly keg sales. But it makes sense -- if you can only brew 4 pony kegs at a time, you could have a wider distribution with a higher margin by bottling. I'm guessing it makes your startup costs a little more manageable as well: you don't invest in big kegs at the outset, just a bunch of little bottles that you add into your price.

The two beer styles Mike lists so far on his website are "a straightforward ale with a Flemish kiss", and a barrel-aged sour brown. Should be an interesting addition to the Portland scene.