Seattle and Vancouver today boast a similar number of craft breweries, but Portland consistently gets recognized as having the continent’s best beer. It certainly pours enough of it, and our first stop at Rogue Ales showed why. Their Dead Guy Pale Ale and Flip Flop Pineapple Hef knocked my socks off. Whistles whetted, we headed over to one of the city’s newest breweries, Grand Fir, to meet with chef-owner Doug Adams. Partnering with an experienced brewer who happens to be his wife, Doug left a high-profile head chef gig to pair exceptional cuisine with exceptionally crafted beer. Just don’t call it a gastro-pub. “If you’re not serving good food, this city will eat you alive,” Doug tells us over asparagus dressed with jalapeno caper relish, a mouth-watering blue cheese wedge salad, and smoked Calabrian pepper hot sauce wings that brought a tear to my eye. Accompanied by the pine, citrusy notes of Grand Fir’s Silver Tip IRA and a Czech-style Texas amber lager, heaven has an address in Portland.
For all the variety, beer is crafted from four basic ingredients: water, hops, malt and yeast. John Harris, an elder statesman of Portland’s craft scene and owner of the excellent Ecliptic Brewing gives us a crash course in both the history, craft and business of modern brewing. He explains that Portlanders have always been supportive of local business, and being a rainy city with a pub culture, it made sense for a few local pubs in the mid-1980s to start brewing their own product. Portland’s advantage over similar scenarios around the world is its outstanding supply of freshwater flowing from the Cascade Mountain Range into the Bull Run Watershed. Ninety per cent of beer is water, and this soft mountain water proved ideal for brewing. I’m proud to notice huge bags of Albertan malt piled up inside the Threshold Brewery, a smaller local operation packed with happy patrons. The malt and yeast that ferments malt into beer can come from anywhere, carefully selected to achieve desired results in colour, crispness and texture. As always, the Canadian prairies deliver the goods.