Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Willamette week. (Portland, Or.) 1974-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 25, 2015)
FOOD & DRINK = WW Pick. DRANK Highly recommended. By MATTHEW KORFHAGE. Editor: MARTIN CIZMAR. Email: dish@wweek. com. See page 3 for submission instruc- tions. 25 BOTTLES OF BEER ON THE WALL THE ULTIMATE VERTICAL TASTING OF HENRY WEINHARD’S PRIVATE RESERVE. WEDNESDAY, FEB. 25 Cascade Tart Fruit Fest The Cascade Brewing Barrel House is often one of the fi rst stops for beer tourists in town, but for a week you get to be a tourist at home. The Barrel House will have one-off s, vintage blends and limited-availability tarts on tap all week, from Candied Cantaloupe to Shrieking Violet to goji berry and date beers. No admission: Just soak up the bounty. Cascade Brewing Barrel House, 939 SE Belmont St., 265-8603. Noon. Through March 2. SATURDAY, FEB. 28 Brewstillery Festival One of the best features at StormBreaker is the liquor-beer pairing, and here they take that love large: 18 brewers, 12 distillers and a bunch of pairings. Clear Creek, Stone Barn and the rye-makers at Stein will be on hand to match up with such local brewing stalwarts as Hair of the Dog, the Commons and Upright. Not a festi- val to miss. StormBreaker Brewing, 832 N Beech St., 971-703-4516. $20-$25 for 10 tickets. BY PA R KER HA LL and “That actually has something that smells like a hop, but probably isn’t. I am now scared, because theoretically this should be the best one...” “It’s got a weird, watery limeness that I can’t put my fi nger on, like a really old Bud Light Lime.” “This one’s a little sweeter. I am surprised how diff erent these two are, actually.” “It’s a little better balanced, like a horribly old Oktoberfest.” “This one actually smells like beer, and it has something that might, a long time ago, have been a bubble.” SUNDAY, MARCH 1 243-2122 “Robust, but in a foreboding sort of way.” “It tastes like drain water that just rolled over a dead squirrel.” “To me, it is more like the last little bit of the pool water left before it is drained completely.” “Do you ever drink out of a water bottle that you haven’t washed in a long time?” “Or smell a growler that you didn’t clean very well and then put the cap back on for a few months?” “I can’t even swallow this.” “This one is kinda good, maybe there is a hump here that I don’t understand.” “No, this is not good. Six was uniquely bad, but this is still terrible.” “This one tastes like Pixy Stix that have been dissolved in water and left outside for a couple weeks.” “What was I thinking?” “We’ve got to get out of here. Looking at these bottles is giving me a cold sweat.” “Like sweet, watery urine.” “In hindsight, I actually agree that it is turning a corner. It’s still gross, it’s just...” “This is what a rotten raisin would taste like.” “Do you think they just cared more in the beginning?” “How is that possible? Raisins don’t really rot...” “I think whoever was storing these cared more in the beginning. Like, he stored them in a fridge for a while or something, then gave up. That man was an idiot. Who sells these for so cheap after keeping them for so long?” “To me, it tastes leather-boot-fi ltered.” 4. Canteen 2816 SE Stark St., 922-1858, canteenpdx.com. The little black box on Stark Street may be known for kale smoothies, but its vegan bowls are the real prize, with ingredients like house kimchee or baked maple tempeh. $. “This tastes like a fl at regular beer, just fl at.” “I feel like I am drinking High Life, just very oxidized.” “That tastes a little bit like vomit water, but that could just be my mouth.” “Please don’t talk about vomit.” “It’s creepily soft, like a wet Muppet.” “It tastes like weird off -brand toff ee you’d get from Grandma.” “This one actually has a fruity nose, almost Belgian.” 5. Taste of Poland 22 Willamette Week FEBRUARY 25, 2015 wweek.com “I honestly think they really did care about the fi rst couple more than the rest.” “It tastes like licking on a ear of corn. Not eating it, just licking it.” “If they made milk out of corn, and then added water to that, this is what I think that would taste like.” KYLE KEY 8145 SE 82nd Ave., 863-6924, cartlandia.com. There’s a dearth of Polish food in Portland—this new cart from the farmers market fave fi xes that with scratch-made kielbasa and pierogi. $. “Not as bad?” “Oddly hard to get open. Those might be bubbles. I seriously almost vomited again.” “It does have several bubbles. And it seems darker than the others.” 3. Boke Bowl West 1200 NW 18th Ave., 719-5698, bokebowl.com/dimsum. Boke Bowl does dim sum, with some dishes a bit like soul food. Skip the chicken and waffl es, and get the fried chicken. $$. “Not as bad.” “This one is…still shitty beer water. I clearly hate myself.” “This is unnaturally bubbly. Also, I am starting to worry about my stomach.” 1852 SE Hawthorne Blvd., 971-340-9734, farinabakery.com. Farina’s macarons are by far the best in town, sure, but have you tried the brownie with ganache? The coconutty, jammy bird’s nest cookie? You have much to do. $. “It tastes like shitty off -brand corn chips in water. At this point, it is hard to speak about these. All I can see is the fi nish line.” “Let’s power through this shit.” “You’re right, this tastes like it was once good.” 2. Farina Bakery [Throws up in his mouth] “It’s really getting hard.” “This tastes like that PIFF movie I reviewed, Corn Island.” “Tastes kinda like a Rogue beer.” 3707 NE Fremont St., 719-7195, fi reandstonepdx.com. After slight patchiness, Fire and Stone is coming beautifully into focus with Toscano salami pie and a moist leg of lamb resting on a bed of bulbs. $$. “Ugh.” “Why is this the most carbonated of them all? I am not sure if I like beer anymore.” “This one is by far the grossest smelling. Taylor Swift was wrong: 22 is horrible, and it feels horrible in my stomach, too.” 1. Fire and Stone “Like licking Ron Burgundy’s mustache on a hot day.” “At this point, all I want to do is stop. I feel like this is making me sick.” (Jan. 13, 1978) “It’s like turpentine. I don’t understand why this one is so much worse.” Where to eat this week. “It’s like the pool of water that a cigar butt has been fl oating in.” “It tastes like the kind of beer you would dig up on a beach if you got shipwrecked.” “It smells kind of like a rye beer, and it tastes like a wet cornfi eld.” Cartathlon V Dress up funny, eat funny food, go on a treasure hunt with physical challenges and riddles. Teams of fi ve compete in a city-traipsing food cart challenge for fi rst place fi nish, best team name, and best team costume. Grand Central Bowl, 808 SE Morrison St., register at wweek.com/cartathlonv. 12:30 pm reg- istration, 2 pm race. $60 for team of fi ve. MA RTIN CIZMA R Today’s Henry Weinhard’s Private Reserve is not craft beer. Made by MillerCoors at an undisclosed location, the bottles of “Northwest-style lager” now shipped across the country aren’t anything like the beer that legendary beer writer Fred Eckhardt called “perhaps the best of its class in the United States” back in 1984. We got our hands on the fi rst 25 numbered bottlings, roughly spanning the years 1977 to ’79. To toast our annual Beer Guide, we decided to sample all 25 to see how they’ve held up. There was only a little vomit—here’s a transcription of our tasting, from newest to oldest. “It still smells like corn and Scotch.” “It still kinda tastes like malt water.”