Alphabet of New Oregon Breweries

The other day Dave invited me over to help out with a growler of delicious Omegatex IPA he'd brought back from a visit to Fort George.  "We also checked out this new brewpub in Astoria called Buoy."  In my Omegatex-addled bliss I was hearing that as "Bowie", like how Texans pronounce "Bowie knife", or how George Clinton pronounces "David Bowie" at about 3:00 in Make My Funk the P. Funk, until he showed me the logo with an ocean buoy on it.  I used to be so good at keeping up with new breweries, but I had never heard of this one.

A couple days later I was reading about the OBG's Malt Ball, which included a beer from another Oregon brewery I had never heard of:  Claim 52 in Eugene.  It made me think that there is almost an A-Z of Oregon breweries that are so new that I haven't tried their beer yet.  That's a bit of a stretch, but let's try and come up with an alphabet of Oregon breweries that have opened in... oh, the last three years (so that we can at least get through the letter G).

I'll get it started, please help me out with the rest, since I'm obviously no longer keeping up with current events, or even past events [Thanks to commenters for J-O, R-U.  And for telling us that apparently Yachats and Zigzag are on the way!]:

• Agrarian
• Buoy
• Claim 52
• de Garde
• Ecliptic
• Falling Sky
• Gigantic
• Humble
• I ???
• Juniper
• Kells
• Logsdon
• Mazama
• North Rim
• Oblivion
• Plank Town
• Q ???
• Rat Hole 
• Solera
• Thunder Island
• Uptown Market
• Viking Braggot Company
• Worthy
• X ???
• Y ???
• Z ???

Wow, that list is very Eugene-heavy.  Is Eugene the next Bend?  Is Ninkasi the beer that made Eugene famous?

One-day only special:  If you happen to be reading this today, March 13, 2014, you can meet the brewers from letters A and P tonight at the White Owl Social Club (SE 8th and Main Street, just down the street from my house).

Hair of the Dog Tasting Room

Yikes!  I finally sit down to grind out this ridiculously late post on Hair of the Dog's new tasting room -- well, it opened in mid-August -- only to discover that Dr. Wort came along just yesterday and turned in an uncharacteristically coherent report on the same subject.  (Uncharacteristically ass-kissing, also.  Geez, Doc, were you visited by three ghosts Saturday night?  Wasn't there anything you can fault Alan on?  That sweatshirt he's wearing in your picture isn't exactly Haute Couture -- are you sure that guy's really a high-class chef?)

Anyway, since I can't outdo Dr. Wort this time -- nor these earlier reports from The Beer Cave and Beervana --  I'll just get a few scattered observations out of my brain and then move on.

Location, location, location. Buying his own place, very centrally located, with a beautiful view of downtown across the river, was an ingenious move on Alan's part.  Remember how hard it was to figure out how to get to the old place, beneath an underpass and behind the railroad tracks?  Parking may be an issue, but it's also a place that's very accessible by bicycle, so maybe putting up a bunch of bike racks could help alleviate that.  He's also right across the street from the new, improved sidewalk across the Morrison Bridge -- in good weather it would be a nice stroll for downtown hotel guests.

Bankers' hours.  2 to 8 PM?  Not sure if I've ever heard of a business with those opening hours, and it's especially weird for a pub -- you're not open for lunch, not open for night owls, and barely open for dinner.  Closed Monday and Tuesday.

Big Dog, Little Dog.  It looks like there will almost always be a 3-4% ABV small beer on tap, made from the second runnings of one of HOTD's bigger beers.  I've had the Doggie Claws Little Dog a couple of times, and it's something really unique and wonderful.  It's light, but hoppy, not sweet at all, but satisfying.  I can't think of any other beer I've had with the same flavors.  Besides allowing you to pace yourself, the Little Dogs are also significantly cheaper than the regular lineup -- $2.50 a glass vs. $4.50 and up.  Word is that there is currently a Matt Little Dog on tap, with the somewhat smoky flavor of the Adam/Matt brew.

Look busy.  I haven't been there enough, but I don't really understand the kitchen situation.  It always looks like Alan and someone else are working really hard with big open flames in the open kitchen, but the menu consists mostly of prefab stuff like charcuterie or hummus plates.  The food seems a little overpriced to me for what it is, with the exception of the beef-brisket appetizer, which seems like quite a bargain for $6 if you share it around.  [Update 2011/04/16: alright, now I've had an excellent, moderately-priced meal there.  I take it all back.]

The best of beers.  In 2009 Hair of the Dog made an exclusive beer for Bottleworks in Seattle called Matt. It wasn't sold in Portland, but I was lucky enough to try it at the old brewery during a private party that was held as a school fundraiser.  It was amazing.  It's a strong, dark, smoky beer along the lines of Adam -- same basic recipe? -- that is then aged in apple brandy barrels from Clear Creek Distillery.  This year Alan made a new batch, that was sold in 12-ounce bottles for $15.  That's a pretty hefty price tag, but it really is a stellar beer -- I've already shared a couple of bottles, and it's delicious.

The worst of beers.  Now, on the other hand, there were a couple of very questionable beers on tap at the tasting room the weekend that Matt was released last month:  two versions of Fred from the Wood, one aged on peaches, and one on apricots.  The peach one was tolerable -- though not as good as plain ol' Fred from the Wood -- but the apricot one was very vinegary, with the added insult of acetone.  Not just a little vinegar, and a little acetone, but copious, sinus-clenching quantities.  Debbie caught Brett's first taste of it on this video: you can tell it's not a minor flaw in the beer, but something overwhelming. 
Frankly, it should not have been served, and I have to wonder why Alan let it out the door.  If you wanted to offer free tastes to adventure seekers, maybe.  But charging $3 for small tasters of a bad mistake is not a very good move.


So, from one of the veterans of Portland's beer scene, a promising new start, despite the apricot-vinegar misfire. The tasting room is sure to be a prominent fixture for years to come, especially if it can start staying open past 8.

Bushwhacker Cider

In a town with hundreds of taverns and dozens of beer bloggers, I guess it was inevitable that a beer blogger would open a pub. Bushwhacker Cider was opened recently at SE 12th and Powell by Bulls & Brew author Jeff Smith and his wife Erin. As suggested by the name, it's a cider place, not a beer place, though they intend to keep a keg of good Oregon beer on one of their seven taps, and they have a selection of lighter European beers for use in cider-beer drinks.

With five or six ciders on tap -- most about $4 a pint -- and a large selection of bottled cider for either on-premise consumption or to go, Bushwhacker wants to be Portland's cider headquarters. They will also start making their own cider soon, while maintaining the guest taps and bottles for sale. Erin said that the feds at the TTB had to scratch their heads for a while over that business model -- apparently there is no other cidery in the country that also sells cider from other producers. Look for Bushwhacker's first house-made offerings around the first of the year.

Dave and I popped by to throw some darts last week, and we were impressed with the dart setup -- plenty of light and plenty of room at the two dartboards. We did have to impose ourselves between the regulars that were already sitting at the tables by the dartboards, but they were amiable and didn't seem too bored by our questionable dart skills.

It was a little distressing that there wasn't a beer on tap that night, which was the only way I dragged Dave down there. They had most recently served Ft. George's Cavatica Stout, and were waiting for another keg of something special from Ft. George, but there were only 7 ciders on tap, so we bravely plunged into cider world. Erin suggested the Magner's cider from Ireland for someone who was used to drinking beer, and it suited me pretty well. Dave went for the Ace Joker, about twice as strong as the Magner's, crisp and dry, pretty good. Neither would win me over from being a beer guy, though.

The bottle selection is really reasonably priced, and Bushwhacker doesn't charge a corkage fee. There were some interesting bottles, both domestic and imported, most in the $6 to $8 range. Since a 750 ml bottle is about a pint and a half, that's basically the same price as the ciders on tap. I found the Basque-country cider from Petritegi to be the most interesting thing in the house -- yeasty and a little tart, it seemed a little more special than most of the other things I tried. If you can go for something sweeter, I like Blue Mountain's Cherry cider, but you'd have to be in the mood for it.

Bushwhacker took the fiscally responsible move of opening without a kitchen. That means you can bring in your own food, but you can't bring your children. There's a nice patio out front, and a variety of casual seating inside. One issue that Jeff and Erin are working on is lighting -- when they got the space it was outfitted with about 100 bright fluorescent lights ranged along the ceiling. After one night in the place gave them all a bad headache, they turned off all of them but the one over the dartboard. Even that one fluorescent is kind of a buzz-killer, but they're working on some replacement lighting.

If you're planning on biking to Bushwhacker from the north, its location on Powell west of the 17th Avenue vortex limits your choices. Dave and I thought we could avoid a rush-hour trip down 11th by crossing Powell at 21st, but that just leads you into heavy-rail no-man's land. 11th/Milwaukee isn't all that terrible, but if you want to avoid the traffic and the stoplight, there is a funky bike-ped cloverleaf over Powell at 9th. Turn left on Franklin and it will get you over to 12th Avenue.

Cascade Barrel House

The recent spate of pub openings in SE Portland has overwhelmed our tiny newsroom here at It's Pub Night. Plus, we wanted to give you round-the-clock coverage of the Fresh Hop movement, and give a fair and balanced assessment of the angry, hard-drinking Real Portlanders who are rising up against what they call "FINO beers" -- short for "Fresh-hop In Name Only" -- in other words, beers that are sold as Fresh Hop beers but which contain 100% dried hops. Aren't we dried enough already?

But now it's time to catch up with some of the new places around the neighborhood, starting with the Cascade Barrel House, which has been in the works for well over a year. It finally opened a couple of weeks ago, and it's a welcome addition to the neighborhood.

I'm not as big of a sour-beer fanatic as a lot of the beer geeks out there, but Ron and Curtis and the gang at Cascade have risen to national prominence with their barrel-aging program, specializing in fruit beers. The Kriek is my favorite -- something about cherries and beer -- but there are a staggering number of masterfully-done beers on the lineup: Noyaux, with apricots, raspberries, and roasted apricot pits; The Vine, with grapes; Sang Rouge, a blend of lots of crazy stuff. Extra credit to Cascade for not intentionally or unintentionally mangling the French names like many places do.

Since I'm also not a fan of driving across town, one black mark on my record is that I have never been to Cascade's Raccoon Lodge pub. But I held out long enough and they broke down and opened their Barrel House and pub within walking distance of my house. I haven't tried any of the food yet, but they have an impressive lineup of 15 or so Cascade beers on tap -- about a third of which are more traditional ales for you non-sour people -- plus two rotating taps that pour straight from the barrel. The atmosphere is relaxed and casual. A lot of the seating is barbecue-place picnic tables which can be moved out to the front patio in good weather; there are also a few booths, bar seating, and a couple of tall barrel-top tables.

The Barrel House also has a constellation of familiar faces working the bar or behind the scenes: Angelo from Brewpublic, festival impresario Preston Weesner, and former Green Dragon/Grand Central bartender Cody. Another great thing is that they open for lunch every day at 11 AM. Minors are allowed until 10 PM.

[Update: Nice post from Charles with some behind-the-scenes photos.]

Pubs of Portland Tours

Yesterday I went on part of a pub crawl organized by Marc Martin and Charles Culp. Not unusual in and of itself -- I'm often drinking beer with those guys -- but this was a preview of their new business venture: Pubs of Portland Tours. It's a great idea -- guided pub crawls that get around solely on foot and by public transport. What better way to give people a glimpse of the Portland lifestyle than by getting them on their feet, on trains and buses, and drinking good beer?

OK, sure, a better way would be to make them ride bicycles between pubs -- this was an idea I tried to pitch to Dave next door when I was between jobs a few years ago -- but in our lawyer-infested society that simply isn't practical. You couldn't get insured to do it, and you wouldn't chance it without insurance. In fact, those kind of liability issues are what defined the Pubs of Portland model. Originally Marc thought he would do van tours of pubs, but insurance costs led him to look in a different direction. He and Charles guide the tours, but participants pay for their own beer and even their own transit passes. Take that, lawyers and insurance leeches!

Each tour will have at most 12 participants, and costs $25 per person cash ($27 if you pay with plastic). For that you get:

• Walking/transit tour of 3 or 4 Portland brewpubs (about 5 1/2 hours long).
• Expert beer advice and education on the brewing process
• Meet and greet the brewers
• Portland historical information
• A brewery tour if desired

Marc takes the educational aspect seriously -- he has a masters degree in education and is a fanatic beer evangelist.  I have fond memories of him stomping around the Lucky Lab patio each year during the hop-shucking bee, examining peoples' cones and pronouncing on what variety they are based on their shape, size, or aroma.  And while "historical information" might sound like a stretch for a beer tour, think of how many breweries are located in the historical part of town.  On yesterday's tour, I learned that the Centennial Building that houses Portland's branch of Rock Bottom was the largest building of its time in 1876, and its construction displaced the existing Chinatown to its current location (where it displaced a Japantown).

The tours start at 12 noon 6 days a week at Pioneer Square downtown, for easy connection to MAX, streetcars, and downtown hotels.  Pubs of Portland will choose the itinerary, but if your group has bought out the whole tour, you can work with them to hit the destinations you want.

I like it that they're just easing into the business slowly -- rather than try and dive in during the frenzy of July, they'll do their first tours starting September 1.  Call them for reservations (hey guys, what's with the Austin phone number? You should be in the 503 now, or at least the 1-800).  I'm sure they expect mostly tourists, but it's not a bad deal even for locals who have yet to make the rounds of Portland's great pubs and breweries.

Coalition Brewing Opens for Business

While I was in Texas, Coalition Brewing opened at SE 28th and Ankeny where Noble Rot used to be a few years ago. Coalition is only about a year late: in April 2009 when word of the new brewery got out, they expected to open that summer under the name Hobo Brewing. Think of the pubs that have been built out and opened during that time: Migration, Apex, and Breakside come to mind.

A few of us went by late last week to check Coalition out (sorry about the picture, Dave). The beers fit into standard Northwest pub styles -- a pale ale, a stout, a red ale, and a hoppy bitter -- which suits me fine, those are all good to drink. The stout was my favorite: dark and creamy, nice roasty flavor with a thick tan head. Dave liked the bitter, though for my money I would have liked to see it with a little less hops, more English style, especially since the northwest red had the hops covered really well. Everything we tried was solidly well done -- no misfires. I didn't write down any of the clever beer names, but they were all of a pretty reasonable strength, between 5% and 6% if I remember correctly.

Why don't people opening new pubs start right out with honest pints? I mean, they don't have to be 20-ounce pints, just something with a line marking the volume. It's the wave of the future, best get on it right away.

The space is pleasant but pretty tiny: inside there are seats for about 30 people, including 3 or 4 at the bar, and there are 4 or 5 tables outside on the sidewalk. The brewing operation is actually in a building across Ankeny. I believe the original plan was to brew in the same building as the pub, which would have been madness if the kitchen area is on the same scale as the front. Someone is living in the apartment above the pub -- maybe at some point Coalition will be able to expand into that space. It's a great bicycle destination -- there's a bike-parking corral a few steps away on 28th.

The panini-style sandwiches were decent, but nothing to rave about. None of us were brave enough to try the mini-meatloaf muffins. Our visit ended in something of a rush: it was last week during Portland's bizarre mosquito infestation, and when the breeze died down right after sundown, we went howling away slapping our foreheads, ears, and ankles.

But the beer is the main thing, and Coalition does it right. I'm glad to welcome them to the neighborhood!

A Peek at Apex

It's not as though we lacked choices for beer bars in Southeast Portland, but the newly opened Apex at 12th and Division has generated a lot of excitement in town. And for good reason: owner Jesse McCann promises 50 taps of craft beer, reasonable prices, hours from 11:30 AM to 2:30 AM every day, meticulously clean tap lines, and tons of bike parking. Whew! Sounds good.

I've been to Apex a couple of times now, and I really like it. It's probably going to be one of my most regular haunts, especially since Los Gorditos taqueria next door makes it a fast, cheap lunch option, and Beermongers is conveniently located right across the street. The beer menu on the bar's website is kept up to date in real time: in fact the menu in the bar is a big-screen TV that shows the website.  What a simple yet brilliant idea. One disappointment is that Apex didn't hit the ground running with honest pints. Some Belgian and European beers will be served in correct glassware with marked volume lines, but the standard pints are just in regular conical pint glasses.  Also, it would be nice if the beer was served a little less cold.

According to Ezra, Apex's atmosphere is inspired by San Francisco stalwarts Toronado and Zeitgeist. You can see the similarities: like Toronado, the focus is entirely on good beer at reasonable prices with no food service but loud music; like Zeitgeist there is a lot more seating outside than in, and you park your bicycle right in the beer garden. However, there are noticeable differences: unlike its SF cousins, there are lots of windows and light inside Apex, and the outside seating is right out on the street, not hidden in the back. Also, the no-smoking policy on the patio makes it quite different from Zeitgeist. Not to be negative, but the "No"s kind of define Apex:

• No smoking anywhere.
• No food.
• No table service.
• No kids.
• No dogs.
• No credit cards.
• No car parking.
• No dartboard.
• No toilets.  Just kidding, there are two: one Men's and one Unisex.

All of those make good sense to me, except I do wish there was a dartboard.  If kids or dogs were allowed, I would sometimes show up with one or the other, but there are also times when you'd like to be away from everyone else's kids and dogs, so I don't count those as negatives.

The place is open now, but the Grand Opening celebration will be May 7th.  Obviously I'm a little late reporting on Apex.  For further reading, check out Ezra's insider's guide to Apex (he's working there), or these eyewitness reports from Angelo, Jason, and Jeff (pedXer).

First Impressions of Migration Brewing

A handful of the Pub Night gang headed over to Migration Brewing yesterday for its opening night. There are only guest taps for now, but next Wednesday they will put on their Migration Pale Ale. The fine folks at Lompoc Brewing are doing a great community service by letting brewer Michael Branes brew on their system until Migration's rig is ready. That's Michael on the left in the picture, next to co-founder Colin Rath at last night's opening.

The space is nicely done, with high ceilings open to the rafters, lots of unfinished wooden tables, and a couple of nooks with couches in them. Last night we sat at about the spot where a pile of dirt sat next to the kegerator on my exploratory visit a few months ago -- you can see how much work went into getting the place ready. It's not a huge space, but with the open feel, the garage door in front, and the wooden bowls of peanuts in the shell, it's kind of like a Lucky Lab with a nice paint job. I hope that doesn't sound snarky in either direction -- I love hanging out at the Lucky Lab and I think Migration will have a nice hangout vibe also.

There is a square cove to the right of the bar which will soon become the home of a couple of dartboards.  Hooray!  It's a good setup, there will be a "lean bar" about chest height along the dart room wall, a place to set your beer and darts.  It's tucked away nicely, there shouldn't be any traffic issues there.

One quibble: I wish Migration had hit the ground running with honest pints instead of the ubiquitous shaker pints. Given all the similarities with the Lucky Lab, I'm surprised they didn't break out imperial pint glasses.  Or, being a new operation, why not start out on the right foot and have glassware marked with a 16-ounce or half-liter line?  More and more places are doing that these days.

Some more general observations:

• Kids are allowed until 8 PM
• Good bike racks out front
• Food is simple (sandwiches, sausages), but pretty reasonably priced.  Most things seemed to be about $7.50.
• The patio will be a great place to hang out in good weather

For further reading: eyewitness reports from Jason and Angelo.

Beermongers Now Open!

Only a couple of months behind schedule, a new bottle shop has opened at the corner of 12th and Division: The Beermongers. Last night they were celebrating the "soft opening" with balloons and a keg of Ninkasi Total Domination. The shop currently has about 185 kinds of beer on the shelf, with room to bump it up to about 250. Beermongers is open 11 AM to 9 PM, seven days a week.

You might ask yourself, what's a success strategy for a smallish beer store in Southeast Portland? They're not far from New Seasons on Division, which has a really good beer selection. And they don't plan to match the 1000-beer selection of Belmont Station. So what is the angle? Surprisingly, Beermongers plans to compete on price, with prices lower than Belmont, New Seasons, convenience stores, or even Fred's or Safeway. I never would have come up with that idea, but it sure warms my penny-pinching heart.

The proprietors are Sean Campbell and Craig Gulla, a couple of longtime McMenamins employees, seen here ringing up a $9 12-pack of Session Lager -- that's an old-timey SPE of $4.91. Craig told me that the plan is to keep the everyday prices low, and not rely on special sale prices. That's a nice price on Session: on my way home I stopped into New Seasons and saw it priced at $12. Some other low prices I noticed were:

• Bridgeport IPA: $6 6-pack
• North Coast Old Rasputin: $7.80 4-pack
• Unibroue 750ml bottles: $6.35
• Paulaner Salvator: $2.05 half-liter

[Update 2009/09/23: Turns out these were extra-low grand-opening prices. Session is now $11-something, Bridgeport $7.20, Paulaner $2.50. Not those original 25% discounts, but still good prices.]

The space itself reminded me a lot of By the Bottle in Vancouver, and the beers are arranged by style similarly to By the Bottle and Belmont Station. Even though there are plenty of snob-worthy beers, Beermongers also stocks Bud-Miller-Coors and Pabst, priced aggressively. They have an on-site license, so future plans include a small bar with three or four local taps, and a little bit of seating if you want to sample a bottle right off the shelf. Craig said they also plan to stock a small selection of reasonably-priced wines to cater to multi-beverage households. It would have saved me a trip to New Seasons last night, so I think their instincts are good.

I've heard two different rumors of pubs that might go in across the street from Beermongers, so this corner of Ladd's Addition might be a happening little beer area in the coming years. Best of luck to The Beermongers in their new venture!

Upright Brewing's First Firkin

Tuesday evening Belmont Station offered a special treat: the first public tasting of a beer from Portland's newest brewery, Upright Brewing. Upright, located just north of the Rose Garden on the tiny piece of Broadway that lies in the 5th Quadrant, is one of the growing number of Oregon breweries that are avoiding the restaurant business, choosing instead to distribute kegs and do a little bottling. The owner-brewer, Alex Ganum, is on the left in this picture, next to ex-Lompoc brewer Lem and Pub Night stalwart Charles.

The Upright brew served up Tuesday night on Belmont's cask engine was Studebacher Hoch Strong Ale, a dark, malty confection with some extra hops in the firkin. Put it in the "dangerous" category -- its smooth roastiness completely disguised its 8% strength. Alex intends to focus on more session-style beers at Upright -- 4% to 5% -- so he was dubious about debuting with the strong ale, not wanting to give people the wrong idea. The Studebacher was brewed to be aged in barrels until winter, but after his barrels were full he had exactly one keg's worth left. A friend had an extra firkin lying around, and convinced Alex to fill it and sell it to Belmont Station. It was meant to be.

The first thing you notice about the Studebacher is its maltiness. I think the beer it reminded me the most of is Eel River's Triple Exultation, but with less alcohol and hops. I fancied that there was a yeasty flavor there also, not a flowery Abbey yeast, but a little fresh-dough vapor. That might just be my imagination, suggested by Alex's open-fermentation methods -- something no one else in Portland is doing. At any rate, it was quite tasty; I'll be interested to try the barrel-aged version in a few months.

Alex said the first Upright beer we'll see around town will probably be a wheat beer made with a saison yeast. Talking about his goal of high-flavor, low-alcohol beers, he said he enjoys tweaking the noses of Portland beer geeks by saying that the beer he would most like to emulate is Widmer Hefeweizen. It's no joke: Alex says one of the best bets in town is to sit down at the Gasthaus and have a fresh, unfiltered Hef -- tasty, balanced, and not too strong -- poured right at its birthplace. He has a point. The supermarket bottles of Hef are quite dull, but fresh on tap -- with, say, your favorite Lebanese dinner -- it's another animal entirely. It will be a big win for Portland if Upright comes up with similarly food-friendly, drinkable beers like that.

The Belmont Station Biercafe has really been whipping it lately with interesting beers from smaller Oregon breweries. Even though it's just part of their priestly mission, I have to award them community service points for offering us this early preview of Upright.

For further reading, Angelo has a nice backgrounder on Alex with a short interview.

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!

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.