Pop Go(s)es the Apuckerlips

It's always a treat to stop by Cascade Brewing Barrel House. You never know what special treats they may have lurking in the barrels behind the bar...unless, of course, you get regular emails telling which special beers are  being poured. And when.

(L-R) Autumn, Summer, Spring, Winter

Last Thursday marked the annual Four Goses of the Apuckerlips event. Gose (pronounced gose-uh) is an historic, sour wheat beer. Each of Cascade's four Goses is designed for a season. They are light and just slightly sour. Each one is brewed with sea salt and various spices and they all come in around 5.5% ABV.

They were pouring Spring Gose 2011, spiced with wild chamomile, lemon peel and culinary lavender; Autumn Gose 2010, spiced with cinnamon, nutmeg and orange peel; Summer Gose 2011, spiced with coriander; and  Winter Gose 2011, spiced with rose hips, orange peel and cinnamon.

These were all good beers. I am a big fan of the Cascade beers, especially the ones that don't exert ultra-tart flavors. The Gose beers are all pleasantly sour, light and crisp. It makes sense. These are wheat beers and the ABV is near session level. Each of them is tasty and highly refreshing.

My favorite, for what its worth because opinions are going to vary, was the Summer 2011 Gose. It's creamy smooth body and mellow spices are followed up by lingering and dusty lemon finish. "Hey," I thought. "I could drink a lot of this stuff on a hot summer day." Wait, I could drink a lot of it almost any day.

I continue to be impressed with the blending and aging program they have going on at the Barrel House. Lots of other breweries are playing around with barrel-aging and blending. But no one, to my knowledge, is doing it on the scale that it is being done here. Not in Portland.

Black Friday Follow-up and Notes

One of the things I strive for with this blog and anything else I write for public consumption is journalistic integrity. With respect to beer, I refuse to simply parrot what the various breweries, pubs and retailers. I collect information from the appropriate sources and interject my own thoughts as I write.

I followed that course when I put together the post on the Return of Workhorse at Laurelwood. I first reported the official reason why Workhorse was taken out of production: a shortage of hops. That's the information they gave me. I then provided a personal interpretation of why Workhorse was taken out of production: to make way for Gearhead as their standard IPA, with an imperial version of Workhorse to be released soon thereafter.

Workhorse is back on Laurelwood's big board

My interpretation was not well-received by Laurelwood brass. It's not hard to understand why. A lot of people were unhappy about the demise of Workhorse and many of them didn't believe the official explanation. I was tossing gasoline on the fire. You get the drift.

In the spirit of fair play and good beer, I spent some time talking to Laurelwood brewmaster, Vasili Gletsos, yesterday. I had not met him before. We spent an hour or so bouncing all kinds of beer thoughts around. Vasili is a great guy. They're lucky to have him at Laurelwood and I suspect he will do great things there.

Below are a few updates to my prior post, based on my conversation with Vasili:

• Although Laurelwood considered tweaking the Workhorse recipe and releasing it as an imperial IPA, they eventually decided against the idea. Plans change all the time, Vasili said. 
• There are no plans to release an imperial version of Workhorse this year. An imperial version may happen at some point, but the timeline is uncertain.When it happens, Imperial Workhorse will likely be part of their specialty series, with availability limited to select bottleshops.
• Gearhead is Laurelwood's standard IPA going forward, widely  available on draft and in bottles at grocery stores, bottleshops, etc.
• The A-Z IPA program was never intended to be lengthy. As Workhorse was running out last summer/fall, Vasili launched the A-Z program and named the first few beers after racehorses...Aftershock, Best Bet and C-Biscuit. The "D"-beer wound up being Gearhead, which they decided to launch to replace of Workhorse, and the A-Z program was tabled.
• A little off the beaten path, Vasili said making less Workhorse has freed up brewing capacity and given them more room to experiment with new ideas. He hopes to use some of that production capacity to produce a lager, with a probable summer release.

So there you have it. My supposition that Workhorse was taken out of production so they could easily release Gearhead and later launch Imperial Workhorse over the top appears to have been mistaken. Their plans for Imperial Workhorse are too uncertain to suggest that strategic course.

As for the A-Z program, the information I was given by a Laurelwood employee last summer was incorrect. Vasili had only recently joined the brewery at that time. He says they are working to improve communication between the brewhouse and the pub.

Deschutes Outing

While I'm (sorta) on the subject of Workhorse, there are a growing number of beers out there that offer similar hops character. This surely has something to do with the fact that the hophead pallet increasingly seeks IPAs that feature piney, citrus, grapefruit notes in flavor and aroma. 

Hop City 2 is front left

On a quick lunch outing today, I tasted an IPA that reminded me a lot of Workhorse  The beer is Deschutes Hop City 2. It's one of their special selections at the Portland pub and they're calling it an experimental IPA. It has 95 IBUs and 9% ABV. Excellent lunch numbers, eh?

More importantly for hopheads, Hop City 2 uses nine hop varieties. It features the same kinds of citrus, pine and grapefruit notes that in my mind make Workhorse so popular. Hop City 2 also reminds me Boneyard RPM. Workhorse, RPM and Hop City 2 make a nice trio, despite Hop City 2's higher ABV. Round 'em up!

There was another beer on the taster tray that deserves mention. In the photo above, it's the beer to the right of Hop City 2. This is a blended beer from their Reserve stock. They evidently blended two parts Black Butte XXII with one part of what he referred to as a "house sour." No matter. This beer has a solid backbone, rich chocolate notes, and is wrapped in a mildly sour presentation. Really terrific job, Deschutes!

The Return of Workhorse

A lot of local hopheads will surely be happy to learn that Workhorse has returned. The popular IPA is now available on draft at Laurelwood's pubs, and draft is the only way you'll find it. More on that in a minute.

Workhorse had been out of production for several months. The official reason for the hiatus was a shortage of the hops required to make the beer, particularly Simcoe. My previous post on what happened with Workhorse is here. The story, as well as my view of what they're doing, has changed somewhat.

Yep, Workhorse is back in the pubs

As Laurelwood eased Workhorse out of the daily mix in late September, they launched Gearhead, a lighter IPA at 6.5% ABV (vs 7.5% for Workhorse). Gearhead has effectively replaced Workhorse as the brewery's flagship IPA. You can find it on draft and in 22 oz. bottles around town.

Coinciding with the release of Gearhead, Laurelwood also launched an A-Z IPA program. They were supposedly going to produce a series of IPAs with names A-Z in the absence of Workhorse. The first three entries were Aftershock, Best Best and C-Biscuit. That program was soon abandoned.

A picture began to emerge as I bounced emails back and forth with Laurelwood owner, Mike De Kalb. He told me they intended to bring Workhorse back as soon as the necessary hops were available in a few months. He said they might reposition the beer as an imperial IPA due to the relatively high ABV. Later, he told me Workhorse would only be available on draft in his pubs.

When I heard it was back on draft, I stopped by the Sandy Blvd. location (a hop and a skip from home) to check it out. Sure enough, this was the beer many of us had been missing for several months. The specs and taste are the same. Hmmm, I thought. I wonder what happened to the idea of repositioning Workhorse as an imperial IPA?

Gearhead: the only readily available Laurelwood IPA for now

Well, De Kalb now tells me they decided not to tweak the recipe and reposition Workhorse. For now, at least. However, they will introduce an imperial version that will be available on draft and in bottles later in the year. No word on whether Imperial Workhorse will be a seasonal or standard beer. My guess is the latter.

I have long-believed the strategy behind taking Workhorse out of production was to expand Laurelwood's IPA line. Workhorse had to be removed from the picture to open the door for Gearhead, a beer that doesn't turn heads in the same way. Now that Gearhead is established, they'll bring in Imperial Workhorse over the top.

As I said in my earlier post, I think it's smart marketing for Laurelwood to have two IPAs out there. It's the most popular style around here, for better or worse, and having two versions available in pubs and bottles is good business...regardless of the zigzags in the official version of how they arrived here.

Unfortunately, they have succeeded in pissing a lot of people off in the process of doing what they're doing. Many people I've talked to have expressed frustration with the changes surrounding Workhorse and say they can no longer support Laurelwood. I suspect those feelings will pass, but negative PR is never a good thing, even when it's related to a change that seems to make good business sense. We'll see what the long-term fallout is.

Getting back to the tease at the top, Workhorse is only available at Laurelwood pubs at the moment. Officially. I believe it has been spotted at other places around town, but it's possible those pubs are finally tapping stashed kegs. You can't get it in a bottle anywhere, but growler fills are available.

Big Trend for 2011? Event Craziness

I've been reading a lot of year-in-review posts on various blogs. We all feel the need to share what we think were the most significant developments of 2011. Ezra posted a review in photos over on The New School blog and Jeff shared his view of the trends on the Beervana blog. All well and good.

While I'd love to talk about the growing popularity of barrel-aged beers or the changing pallet of Oregon beer drinkers, it seems to me the runaway trend for 2011 was the frenetic number of special events that graced the calendar all year long. Seriously off the hook.

One of many

I've mentioned this before. The pace of events and special beer releases got to the point last year that most of us couldn't keep up. There was talk of event fatigue as summer waned and the beer scene became a blur. Things didn't slow much into the fall.

I leave it to readers to decide if the virtual tsunami of special events, brewer's tastings, mini-festivals, etc., is good for the craft industry. I realize the power of social media is growing and that breweries and beer fans feel the need to use it. Everyone wants to promote their brand. However, I think there's a bit of ADHD involved.

One more...

One of the offshoots of the special event craze is that everyone feels the need to brew special beers for these things. This has gone far beyond the seasonal concept. Breweries are producing special beers often with eclectic ingredients and unrefined recipes to support special events.

All these special beers, whether they are summer beers, fresh hop beers or strong winter beers, typically share the fact that they are produced for events. It is no longer cool to pour one of your house beers at a special event. Nope. You've got to create excitement and buzz by creating something truly unique and possibly reckless. Toss in some pumpkin rind, cloves, vanilla beans, coffee beans, peppermint, bacon, wet hops, cranberries, chilies, dandelions, etc. Whatever it takes.

And one more

Let me digress for a moment. On a recent road trip, I visited several breweries. These are all well-known establishments with great beer lists. My conclusion was that the standard house beers were far more refined than the seasonal offerings.

I started thinking about it. Why wouldn't that be the case? Brewers spend a lot of time and effort refining their house beers...often over many years or decades. Seasonal beers don't generally get the same sort of attention. Gee, I wonder where special event beers appear on the priority list?

So our ADHD-inspired special event calendar may well be creating a playground for experimental brewing, but the beers produced are not always particularly good. In fact, my experience is that the beers are often half-baked and not ready for prime time. I'll let you decide the meaning of this.

Boneyard Builds Unique Brand

Bend's Boneyard Brewing has turned a lot of heads among Portland's craft beer fans since it opened in April 2010. The brand that built a reputation primarily on a couple of excellent IPAs is moving onward and upward.

The quasi-elegance of the Boneyard brand

There's no pretentiousness here. When you pull up in front of Boneyard, located in a mixed residential/industrial neighborhood in Northwest Bend, you are greeted by a rustic, ornamental motorcycle. Brewdog, X, is casually vigilant near the warehouse door. This is old school.

Walking up to the door, I was greeted by co-owner and head brewer Tony Lawrence. This was strictly by chance. I didn't call in advance to arrange a tour or interview. I was pleased to meet Lawrence, then amazed when he spent more than an hour showing me the place and telling me about Boneyard.

Beerlogist checks his production notebook

Lawrence, who formerly worked at Deschutes Brewing and Firestone Walker, announces himself as a beerologist, saying it more accurately describes his role. There are several brewers on the payroll at Boneyard and they were hard at work as I walked around with the boss. The 20 bbl brewhouse and collection of fermenters are packed into the available space.

The Boneyard tag itself is interesting. Bend beer fans will probably recall that this place was originally to be called Brewtal Brewing (according to the initial story in The Bulletin). The name morphed into Boneyard Brewing prior to the opening in April 2010. There are reasons for everything.

An example of Boneyard's make-it-here approach

"Boneyard is a name that makes sense for us," Lawrence said, "because beer isn't the only thing we make here. We make a lot of the stuff used in the operation. We can weld and we make our own tap handles, among other things. Recycling discarded stuff from the proverbial boneyard for use in and around the brewery is something we strive for."

As for the beer, Boneyard has a serious problem: They simply cannot make enough beer in the current facility to keep up with demand. They have risen quickly on the OLCC's sales list, coming in at #20 on the Year-to-Date Taxable Barrels sales report for October 2011 (the reports are always two months behind, Lawrence said).

They will soon add three additional fermenters to the mix. That will increase output somewhat, perhaps to the point where Boneyard can begin to seriously think about actively pursuing distribution by 16 oz. can. That plan has been on the drawing board from early on. They even own a $35,000 canning machine...which sits idle.

Canned RPM IPA will eventually happen

"I had hoped to be doing some distribution by can by now," Lawrence said. "But we're barely able to keep up with draft distribution (just the Northwest for now) and there's no way I want to alienate our distributors by launching the canning project and shorting our draft supply. We'll get to canning when we're ready."

It seems likely they won't be ready until next summer at the soonest. Lawrence said Boneyard recently signed a lease on a new building which will house a 50 bbl brewhouse, with plenty of space for fermenters and growth.

"The reality is we just don't have enough room in the present building to house the kind of brewing facility we need to be able to build out the brand," Lawrence said. "The new space, once we get it up to speed, will allow us to supply the draft and retail distribution channels...I hope."

The current brewing operation...too small

When retail distribution comes, RPM IPA in 4-packs of 16 oz. cans will be the first beer to appear on shelves. It will be available primarily at bottle shops and perhaps at grocery stores like Whole Foods and New Seasons. Lawrence isn't ruling out distribution by bottle and says a 750 ml bottle is possible.

"Canning is the road we plan to go down, and we're set up for it," he said. "But never say never with respect to bottles. I see successful breweries doing draft, cans and bottles. You never know. We don't want to rule anything out."

The Boneyard tasting room, located at the brewery, is small and friendly. Beer fans headed to or through Bend absolutely must stop by. The motif fits in well with the uniqueness of the Boneyard brand. Generous tastes will cost you $1 a piece, well worth it.

On my visit, they were pouring RPM IPA, Skunk Ape IRA, Femme Fatale, Backbone and Diablo Rojo Red in the tasting room. All were quite good. I also tasted Hop Venom from a fermenter, which was a little green, as well and several other beers in the backroom. Fun times.

The Boneyard tasting board

Lawrence, the perfectionist, claimed the RPM was a little off. He said a new batch of hops was somewhat green and had shifted the taste in an unfavorable way. Honestly, I thought it tasted fine. RPM has a great aroma and some of the citrus and pine notes that make it a viable competitor for Pliny the Elder.

One final note on Hop Venom and RPM: Lawrence said he is in the process of dialing both of these beers down a bit in terms of ABV. RPM, currently 7.5%, is being dialed down to about 7%. Hop Venom will go from 10% to 8.8%. This is part of an effort to improve the drinkability of both beers.

New Year's Eve 2012

Happy New Year, everyone. Have a safe evening.

Flying the Unfriendly Beer Skies

Despite the growing popularity of craft beers, you don't have to look far to see how the macros continue their efforts to program people into accepting lousy beer. The evidence is everywhere...on TV, on store shelves, on billboards.

The principle is pretty simple. If you bombard people with enough messages associating your beer with good times, you won't have to worry about making decent beer. Anheuser-Busch (InBev) and MillerCoors have been taking this philosophy to the bank for years, and are official proof that this strategy is alive and well.

So it really shouldn't surprise anyone that the reach of the beer conglomerates extends to the airlines. If you want to drink a decent beer while you're in the air, you'll probably have to smuggle it aboard. Terrorist.

Elevating my spirits with this beer list is problematic

First, let me say that I've warmed up to Southwest Airlines. I've gotten used to the cattle call otherwise known as boarding. I actually like the no frills aspects of the airline. They are obviously one of the more efficient air carriers out there. I have nothing against them...well, almost nothing.

A flight to the Bay Area for Thanksgiving gave me a chance to see the current drink offerings on Southwest. That's the booze portion of the in-flight menu you see above. Not a pretty sight. Five bucks for a Bud Light, Coors Light, Miller Lite, Michelob Ultra, Corona or Heineken! Yikes! Standards are obviously pretty low here. 

To me this is just another barrier that needs to be broken down. There's no excuse for any airline to be offering such a shameful list of beers. I'm not suggesting that Southwest should be pouring Pliny the Elder, but it seems to me they could offer a decent pale ale and maybe even something a little darker. A couple of craft choices would be cool.

You hate to assume anything, but my guess is Southwest and other airlines offer what they do because that's what big beer wants them to offer as part of programming. I mean, how can you possibly fly anywhere without the chance to bolster your experience by consuming a tasty Bud Light? Mission impossible. 

Fire on the Mountain Beers by Design

I want to follow-up on my earlier post about the new Fire on the Mountain location on NE 57th and Freemont. The place has been open for about a month and they are now pouring several beers produced in-house. You can jet back to my earlier piece here if you wish.

A quick review: the FOTM brewing facility was put together with assistance from Craig Nicholls, well-known in the local beer community via his time at Alameda, Roots and as organizer of the North American Organic Beer Festival. Ben Nehrling was hired to run the brewing operation. Nehrling previously worked at McMenamin's Kennedy School. Enough said.

I tripped on up the FOTM the other day, eager to check out the brews. The place has been packed to the gills for much of its first month. Knowing that, I got there in the late afternoon just in time to find a spot in the bar area. Tasters up!

The FOTM lineup: NW Pale, Wheat, IPA, Amber

  

Another quick preface: FOTM previously announced they would be offering 4-5 house beers to go with what has historically been a strong guest selection. Besides the four beers I tasted, they expect to release Wonderin' Rye this week. I'm told they also have a stout and a lager waiting in the wings.

Moving right along, there is nothing earth shattering here. The four taster beers are all very clean and pleasantly unoffensive. They have very little bold character. The Eleven (brewed on 11/11/11) is a very drinkable pale. X-tinguisher Wheat has a nice citrus character courtesy of the Sorachi Ace hops. Shocks of Sheba IPA (inspired by KBOO's reggae program) is an organic IPA with middling character. Hoosier Amber has nice layers of malt and a smooth finish.

It would be easy to pan these beers as completely inadequate. But hold on. Step back and consider the big picture here. Fire on the Mountain is mostly about food. And they serve up a lot of spicy food. They are best known for their wings, which are served with a variety of mostly hot sauces. Spicy is the name of the game here. 

After I tasted of the four beers and made brief notes, I suggested to myself that the beers were perhaps designed to go with the food. Luckily, I had some hot wings on the way to verify that thought. Sure enough, the beers, particularly the pale and the wheat, went well with the spicy wings.  

Plenty of high octane beer choices

I wanted to get closer to the bottom of this, so I sent FOTM an email asking for some explanation. I made no reference at all to the opinion I had formed regarding the beer and the food. Ben Nehrling responded in kind: 

We serve a lot of spicy food so I am trying to brew some ales and lagers that help cut the heat and refresh your palate. In terms of viewing the recipes as starting points, we have only brewed ten batches of beer so we had to start somewhere.

There you have it. If you're headed out to any of the FOTM locations for a beer, the IPA and the amber offer the most character. Or you can choose from one of the many guest beers. On my trip the guest taps were staffed by Oakshire, Double Mountain, Amnesia, Sierra Nevada and Mt. Hood Brewing. Plenty of high octane beer power if that's what you're after. Did I mention they also have Rainier?

My final thoughts are these: I suspect the FOTM beers will evolve with time and eventually have more character than these opening salvos. But I don't expect these beers to compete with the big players in the styles. If they're going make an award winning beer, it will probably be a pale or wheat beer. That could happen. When you drink these beers, keep in mind what they're all about.

Beer in Wine Country: Russian River Brewing

Getting back to my post-Thanksgiving Day tour of California, the second stop was Russian River Brewing in Santa Rosa. As noted in the previous installment, Bear Republic was the first stop. Russian River was the inevitable second stop, since it is located between Bear and Lagunitas.

I had high expectations for Russian River. As most beer fans know, they produce some excellent beers, including Pliny the Elder, Blind Pig IPA, Damnation and others. There was probably no way my expectations for this place could have been met.

Line out the door sends ominous signals

First, Santa Rosa. The city was bustling, with lots of traffics and people everywhere. If you're fixing on visiting Russian River, it's pretty easy to find. But the availability of parking is not good and the street parking is not cheap. We were lucky to get a place not far from the pub. That's where our luck ran out.

The place was packed to the gills. It isn't a huge space to begin with, and the hype surrounding this place is evidently bringing in the masses. After waiting in line for a few minutes, a snarky little "greeter" told us it would be about 40 minutes for a table. Terrific.

The beer board was packed with options...like the bar

While my travel companions waited in the outdoor seating area, I looked over the beer menu on the board above the bar. All the usual stuff was there and more. The folks at Russian River, like brewers in Oregon and elsewhere, are engaged in barrel aging and sour beer production. This was news to me. But I digress.

I hung out in the four-deep mosh pit by the bar hoping to get the attention of a bartender. Finally, one asked me what he could do for me. Since I knew there was no seating and this was going to wind up being a quick stop, I ordered the base taster tray...Aud Blonde, O.V.L. Stout, Porter, Russian River IPA, Blind Pig IPA and Pliny. The mistake soon became apparent.

The standard beers were all pretty good. Russian River hasn't made a name for itself with its porter or stout, but those beers were fine. It's the IPA swell that RR has been riding to fame and (I guess) fortune. All the IPAs in the taster tray were good. Pliny has been a favorite of mine, although I'm starting to think it's a bit over-hyped.

The basic taster tray...snarky comments included

The thing is, I should have ordered some of the specialty beers they were featuring. The list was tantalizing. Had things been a little less frenetic around the bar, I likely would have tried to order some combination of barrel-aged and standard beers. Oh well...life goes on.

Russian River makes some fantastic beers. No doubt about it. But my sense is they've had a little too much success and received a little too much hype for their own good. That might help explain the snotty, snarky comments and slow service.

As far as I'm concerned, if I'm looking for condescending attitudes and snarky commentary, I'll go wine tasting. If you're planning a trip to Russian River Brewing, my advice is to visit when the place isn't teeming with yuppies. Good luck with that.

The Digital Stocking Stuffer

This blog has only been around for about six months. I should have been writing it a long time ago, but somehow never did. The blog was born in connection with what I then assumed to be a larger project: a book focused on Portland's craft beer culture.

The concept behind the book was to provide a reference for casual beer fans. My rationale was simple: A lot of people who go out beer tasting in Portland, whether they come from far away or live in the city, need a guide that provides more than just a list of breweries and where they are. I ran into lots of people who needed something like this while I was working on the book.

For sale on Amazon, iBooks and other sites

My little book is not War and Peace. It would come in at somewhere around 100 pages in print. It features a brief history of the Oregon beer industry and how craft brewing started here. It then explores most of the brewpubs and pubs in the city, broken down by quadrant. Maps and photos are included. There are no formal beer reviews, beyond a general mention of what the destinations typically have on tap.

Beervana Rising can be purchased through the various online vendors, including Amazon and Apple iBooks. The price is right: $4.99. The eBook concept fits in with the idea that people who buy the book can take it with them on their phone, eReader, laptop or tablet computer while pub hopping. Pretty cool!

They say ePublishing is the wave of the present and future. I suspect it is. But I also recognize the importance of getting a get a print version of Beervana Rising out there. That may coincide with a second edition or I may get it done sooner. We'll see.

For now, the digital version is out there. It's a great value. If you have an iPad or iPhone, I recommend making the most of your reading experience by buying the book through iBooks. You can certainly read it using the Kindle app, but the experience is richer from the iBooks app. The price is the same.

Cheers

Nothing Common About The Commons

We keep seeing new breweries pop up around Portland. I sometimes wonder how all these places are going to fare, but you can't dwell on it. It seems the common dream of most brewers is to at some point open a brewery or pub. And so it is.

The Commons Brewery is conveniently located in what beer geeks refer to as the Beermuda Triangle. The Triangle comprises much of Southeast Portland, and includes Hair of the Dog, Cascade Brewing Barrel House, The Green Dragon, Lucky Labrador, Hopworks, Coalition and several others. If you're keeping track at home, you can safely add The Commons to that list.

Double taster tray treat (artistic element added)

This place is the brainchild of Mike Wright, who initially launched the brewery in the comfort of his Southeast Portland garage. Soon thereafter, he decided to shoot the moon and expand his nano brewing setup to a 7 bbl operation in a space large enough to brew and conduct barrel fermentation.

The new facility has been operational for a few months, and only recently opened its doors for tastings. A tasting room and brewery is what you'll find here. Wright says he has no designs on turning this location into a brewpub. He hopes to see his beers distributed in draft and bottled form. Some Commons beers have already been poured at pubs around town. The bottling effort will take some time.

Mike Wright handles the colorful tasters with ease

In contrast to most breweries and pubs, the Commons does not feature what I would describe as typical Portland beer fare. There's no IPA on the beer menu. No imperial IPA, either. They also don't offer a stout or a porter. What they produce is a line of Belgian-influenced beers that are designed to, as they put it, "enhance social interaction."

The board shows two standard, year-round beers, along with a couple of seasonal offerings. Then there's the Beetje (pronounced bee-cha) Series. Beetje is a Flemish word, meaning little or little bit. The term refers to small batch beers that are produced at the Commons using predominantly organic ingredients. Four Beetje beers graced the board when I stopped by.

The beer board with plywood motif

Tasting Spree
I opted for the double-fisted tasting experience: Eight wildly colorful beers in exquisite glass ware...and every one of them pretty good. I had several favorites, although opinions will certainly differ.

Urban Farmhouse Ale (5.3% | 27 IBU) This is the lightest of the beers on the board, brilliant gold in color. I am not a huge fan of this style, which is often over-carbonated and too yeasty/fruity for my taste. But this is a great beer. I would love to have one of these in the heat of the summer, though it tasted pretty good on a freezin' Friday evening. Light and refreshing with a subtle floral nose. When bottling eventually gets underway, this will be evidently the first beer to go that route.

Little Brother (8.7% | 21 IBU) One of two seasonal offerings, Little Brother is a strong Belgian ale aged in bourbon barrels.  The barrel aging adds some nice character to this beer...not over-the-top like you find with some bourbon barrel-aged beers. Little Brother is reminiscent of a light barley wine, with lots of chocolate and caramel notes. This is the biggest beer made here, although not that big compared to some of the monsters you find around town.

Barrel treatment in progress

Barrel 1 (6.8% | 21 IBU) This is a tart pale ale aged in pinot barrels. I'm a big fan of the sour beers available at the nearby Cascade Barrel House. Those beers only lose me when they get too sour. Barrel 1 is conservatively sour. It's a lovely beer, pleasantly tart and full of flavor. I look forward to seeing this beer available in a bottle.

Some notes
If you're heading over to check out The Commons, please note that tasting days and hours are limited. They are currently open Friday and Saturday evenings. That may change as things ramp up, so check their website, Facebook page or give them a call to verify.

Unlike some of the smaller tasting spots, The Commons DOES take credit and debit cards...in case you're strapped for cash and need a great beer. Indeed, the checkout system is pretty cool.

It probably goes with saying, but these beers are going to respond well to a bit of secondary fermentation in a bottle. It's a style thing. When the bottling part of the operation gets going and Commons beers are available that way, they will be prized purchases. In my opinion.

Finally, there is very limited bar space here, along with a few barrels. You will very likely find yourself walking around exploring the brewery while sipping the beer. No worries. Mike was mingling with the tasters while I was there and he's happy to share what's happening with the beers.