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.

Double Alt Smackdown

A couple years ago I became obsessed with Alts. I was confused by the wide variation of different beers called "alt" -- the bland industrial alts I remembered from a trip to Germany had nothing in common with the Lucky Lab's Crazy Ludwig's Alt, which was a far cry from Alaskan Amber. Then I brought home a Pinkus Muenster Alt from Belmont Station, and I didn't know which way was up. It took samplings of Uerige Alt and Widmer Alt to set me on the right path.

Uerige also makes a double alt -- called Doppelsticke Alt -- which is nearly twice as strong. Double alts are catching on around Portland as well: Dave Fleming did one at the Lucky Lab before he left there a couple years ago; Hopworks did one a year or so ago; Widmer -- whose (single) Alt was their original flagship -- released 84/09 Double Alt to commemorate their 25th anniversary last year; and Ninkasi's somewhat counter-intuitive choice for a winter seasonal is a double alt called Sleigh'r.

Back in December I picked up a bottle each of the Sleigh'r, Uerige Doppelsticke, and 84/09, intending to corral some friends to help me blind-taste and compare the three. With one thing and another, I never got around to it, but I finally got motivated last week when my friend Brett ordered a glass of the Green Dragon/Oregon Brew Crew double alt -- yes, another Portland version of the style -- and gave me a taste of it.  That was the final straw: I dragged Brett and Lindsey over to my house to finally do the comparison.

My feelings about these double alts are contradictory.  The couple of times I've had the Uerige in the past, I found it too syrupy.  I recognize that someone could make the same complaint about the Widmer, and yet something about it grabs me: it was one of my favorite new beers last year.  On the other hand, Sleigh'r is a drier, more restrained version, but for some reason it doesn't grab me.

So, going into the blind tasting, I expected to like Widmer the best, Uerige next, and Ninkasi third.  Interestingly, when we compared notes later, that was what the other guys expected their preferences would be, too.  Lindsey won the contest, because he correctly identified all three.  I was able to spot the Ninkasi, but I confused Widmer and Uerige.  Brett amazed us by getting all the beers wrong: he thought Ninkasi was Widmer, Uerige was Ninkasi, and Widmer was Uerige.  I assume it was his first time to try Sleigh'r and -- like Jeff Alworth -- he wouldn't have imagined Ninkasi using a lighter touch than Widmer. With that bit of background, he might have made the same guesses as I did.

The Doppelsticke was my favorite of the three, which surprised me since it had rubbed me the wrong way in the past.  Lindsey said he couldn't pick a favorite between Widmer and Uerige.  Sleigh'r was Brett's favorite.  That's two first-place votes for Uerige, one for Ninkasi.  Widmer seemed to have all-around appeal:  it got Brett's and my second-place votes, and Lindsey's tie-for-first.  Brett and I also agreed that the Green Dragon's version was most like the Uerige, so kudos to the Brew Crew for nailing it.

Too bad I didn't get this tasting done while 84/09 and Sleigh'r were still widely available, but if you're interested in double alts, you still might find a few bottles of them at the usual places.

Resurrected Beer Styles

A few nights ago at Spints Alehouse I noticed that they had a 33 cl bottle of Leipziger Gose from Bayerischer Bahnhof on the menu. I've been trying the Portland-brewed Goses from Upright and Cascade -- actually, all of them at once at Brewpublic's Gose Solstice celebration in December -- but had never tried a German one. Bottles of the Bayerischer seemed to elude me, so I was excited that Spints had them. It was quite nice, thirst-quenching and appetizing.  The slight tartness was balanced by the very slight saltiness, and the coriander enhanced the faintly herbal flavor.  Upright and the lighter Cascade versions mimic this one pretty closely, though of course Upright's farmhouse yeast contributes its own herbal notes.

The story behind this beer is fascinating.  Originally brewed in the German town of Goslar -- a UNESCO World Heritage Site and an interesting place to visit, by the way -- the style really caught on in Leipzig before dying out in the 20th century.  The salt in the recipe is apparently there to mimic the taste of the water from Goslar's wells.  Angelo has a really nice post about the history of the style and the local Goses. More background from Jeff here.  And here's a very comprehensive article by Ron Pattinson.

Originally this post was going to be about last night's Fort George meet-the-brewer at the Green Dragon, except that three other bloggers beat me to the punch and wrote it up better than I would have.  But there is a tie-in to this article, because Fort George's Oyster Stout -- called Murky Pearl -- was one of the attractions last night.  Oyster Stouts are another style that was dead or dying, but is making a comeback.  The two I've had, Fort George's and Upright's -- gee Alex, what style can you resurrect next month? -- are not noticeably fishy at all.  At most, there's a slightly briny aftertaste.  They're both worth seeking out; I give a slight edge to Upright's, which will be out in bottles next week.  For more background, read Ezra's excellent article about Oyster Stouts.  The picture here is of Fort George brewer Chris Nemlowill and his wife Zetty McKay.  Zetty is the Coffee Girl that Chris named Coffee Girl Stout after.

These are the "dead" beer styles I can think of that have been brought back to life in our times:

• Gose
• Oyster Stout
• Adambier (Hair of the Dog Adam)
• Witbier (Pierre Celis resurrected this at Hoegaarden)

Any other ones that you can think of?