So what exactly am I walking into? According to the festival’s Website, there will be more than 80 beers, 30 wineries, local spirit makers, a curious and diverse food selection and cheese and chocolate. The festival press release also states there will also be “a global shopping marketplace, cooking demonstrations and educational seminars on the Chef’s Stage, and live music featuring Northwest bands including Keegan Smith & the Fam.” 

This year the festival is hosting a fundraiser for the Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA). At the MDA booth you can purchase a 14 oz. beer or a 4 oz. pour of wine for $5. The beer and wines at the MDA booth are not available at the regular festival booths.

The festival has a people’s choice award, so be sure to vote for your favorite festival beers as well. Astoria Brewing’s Bitter Bitch was winner the last two years, so we’ll see if they can make it three in a row.

The fest runs from noon – 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday, April 2 & 3.  If you’re cheap like me, show up during the first two hours and get your $5 admission waived. Costs are pretty standard, $5 admission, $5 taster cup and tasting token are $1 each.

Be sure to check in with us on Twitter @BSBrewing for live updates from the festival.

After a night at the KLCC Microbrew Fest and some sampling of the local bar scene, we started our day at the Broadway Inn where as you can see, all the classy out-of-town brewers stay. I also recommend the hotel’s neighbor, Burrito Boy, to satisfy your stomach after last call.

Hop Valley Brewing

Our first stop was Hop Valley Brewing in Springfield.  You couldn’t miss the giant sign right off of I-5 and the Gateway Mall.

The location has quite a local history. Prior to producing beers for Hop Valley, the building and the 15-barrel system was home to Spencer’s Butte Brewpub and where the first Ninkasi beers were made.

Open for one year, Hop Valley makes a wide variety of styles including the DD Blonde, 541 Lager, Step Child Red, a Vanilla Porter and, where they really excel, the Alphadelic IPA and the Alpha Centauri Imperial IPA.

Stay in touch with Hop Valley on Twitter and Facebook.

Ninkasi

Our next stop was Ninkasi. Our trip was during Zwickelmania and Ninkasi’s new tasting room was packed. The purple shirted clan was a “drinking club” named the Royal Drunks and some members certainly lived up to at least half of their name. The tasting room is open 11 a.m. – 7 p.m. daily.

Head brewer Jamie Floyd led us on a tour of the brewery and showed us where the brewery will be expanding. Ninkasi’s growth is explosive. They started on a 15-barrel system at what is now Hop Valley, opened the brewery with a 20-barrel system and are now up to a 30-barrel system. Last year the company produced 19,500 barrels and estimates 32,000 barrels in 2010.

Helping fuel that growth, Ninkasi is now available at all Safeways and most Costcos in Oregon.  Total Domination is the company’s top seller, accounting for 60 percent of their total sales.

Information from Ninkasi can also be found on Twitter and Facebook

Oakshire Brewing

Our day concluded at Oakshire Brewing which is growing at a significant rate as well. In 2006 the company started on a 4-barrel system as Willamette Brewing.  They are now up to a 16-barrel system and took production from 300 barrels in 2007 to 2,000 barrels in 2009. Built for growth, they have the capacity to produce 7,500 barrels and are aiming for 3,600 in 2010.

Brewer Matt Van Wyk was our host for the day and seeing as how it was Zwickelmania, he poured us a couple of tastes from the fermenters. Most notable was the 2-day old O’Dark:30 that to the surprise of everyone was already tasting great.

Oakshire’s biggest sellers are the Watershed IPA and the Overcast Espresso Stout. The stout features cold pressed espresso from local roaster Wandering Goat that is added to the beer as it is being transferred from the fermenter to the brite tank.

You can find out more straight from Oakshire by checking them out on Twitter  and Facebook.

Next stop… Corvallis.

(pictures coming soon — hopefully)

Wallace Brewing
During 2008’s snOMG (or Snowpocalypse), the missus and I ventured east to Montana for the holidays. We arrived at our halfway point — Wallace, ID — a little frazzled from crazy roads and a harried departure. There, we discovered a little restaurant called the 1313 Club, and its tiny neighbor brewery called Wallace Brewing. It wasn’t open, but this year, we made it back to Wallace before the tasting room closed.

Generally, the beer at Wallace felt weak compared to many of my favorite Oregon breweries. For one, I think most of their beers had an original gravity of under 1.045, translating to low ABVs. The body mostly wasn’t there. Their cream stout felt nice and bitter. The Red Light amber had a decent malty sweetness.

We bought a growler of the Red Light amber, mostly to see if having a full pint would somehow impart more body than you can get from a tiny glass (hey, I’m not above mind games). We threw it in the trunk and continued on.

It actually tasted a little better two days later. Go figure.

I will definitely stop at Wallace again. If nothing else, their beer has such little alcohol that I don’t feel bad about sampling a small beer before heading back onto the freeway.

Bozeman Brewing
We made it out to Bozeman, where we sampled the Bozeman Brewing (Bozone!) Amber, which is a lusciously sweet amber. It kinda reminds me of dipping my finger into a bucket of malt extract, only with suds. Yum. While skiing up at Bridger Bowl, I also had their winter seasonal, “Steep and Deep,” which was a bittersweet stout (I think). Also good. But the best thing Bozone has to offer is their wicked cool growler.

Madison River Brewing Co.
We took a day off from skiing, and we ventured northeast to Belgrade, MT, about 20 minutes up I-90 from Bozeman to Madison River Brewing Co. Madison River is way bigger than I thought. They do all the contract brewing for Wyoming’s Big Hole Brewing and Utah’s Moab Brewery. I’ve seen Big Hole and Madison River six-packs at Montana and Idaho grocery stores.

Amanda picked their Scotch Ale for her growler. It’s a bit of a tradition of ours to get a pint on the way out of the Bozeman Airport. It’s a dark, peaty, heavy Scotch ale that drinks like a meal.

We also sampled their double IPA, which was a relatively low 7.8% ABV but thick with Amarillo and Simcoe hops. I rate it a 3.5 out of 5. We tried a few others, all of which were quite good. My favorite, however, was their traditional German Hefeweizen. Unlike your cloudy and sweet American Hefeweizen — Widmer, Pyramid, etc — it was zesty and spicy. I got a growler, and it was fantastic.

Double Mountain Brewing
Our long drive home went faster than planned, so we treated ourselves to a stop at Double Mountain Brewery. Nothing like a spicy Jersey Pie and a Hop Lava to make those last rainy, foggy, twisty miles of driving through the Gorge go a little easier. We also picked up a growler of 85 IBU (!!) Fa La La La La La La La La, which is their heavy holiday ale. Delicious.

In other 33 Beers news, I restocked both Belmont Station and Saraveza last night, so be sure to stop by after you hear my colorful, rambling origin story on the radio. Bailey’s Taproom is also stocking the books and represents our flagship downtown location.

And of course, you can also purchase the booklets online if you’re outside PDX but inside the USA. I’ll guarantee pre-Christmas arrival for any books ordered online before 11 PM Pacific time on Sunday, December 20th.

Still not sure about the books? Here’s some unbiased reviews from some of my favorite bloggers:

• Beervana
• Appellation Beer
• Brewvana
• Brewpublic
• realbeer.com Holiday Gift Guide

I’d like to say that the recap blog posts are forthcoming, but as every festival attendee can attest, the details tend to get hazy as the samples take hold, and SMS/Twitter reconstructions can only go so far toward recalling the flavor profiles and production details on some of the more obscure or original microbrews tasted.

Our first product, 33 Beers, is an attempt to solve this “memory problem.” It’s a beer journal we designed for rapidly taking down the important details of a beer. A unique “flavor wheel” is included on each of the 33 pages of note-taking area, and it provides a quick, visual way to describe a beer’s flavor (and recall it later). Simple check-boxes for serving method (draft, can, bottle, etc.) and other key information further speed up the process. The idea is to take notes for later recall, but do so rapidly so you can, you know … enjoy the actual beer?

Best of all, it’s highly portable, unlike the 11×17-sized, color-coded Excel spreadsheets we used to tote around to beer festivals. It easily fits in the front or back pocket of a pair of jeans, and is thinner than most mobile phones. It’s printed in the Northwest on 100% Washington-recycled paper using US-grown soy ink, so it should satisfy even the hippiest of hippie beer drinkers.

We’ve set up a web site to sell the book at 33beers.com, and it’s available in a few stores in the Portland, Oregon area (Saraveza, Belmont Station and Bailey’s Taproom as of this writing). It’s been largely a labor of love, and we’d love it if you’d help us spread the word to the other beer geeks in your life. It’s pretty inexpensive, too; it retails at $4 each or a three-pack is $10. Wouldn’t these look great under your tree?

This is year three for the festival, which has quickly secured a place in my heart. There are a lot of beer festivals in Portland, particularly in June-July, and each has its merits. NAOBF is outdoors in a spacious local park, with easy access to transportation (there’s a Yellow MAX stop across the street from entrance). Kids are welcome, a surprisingly unique feature at most festivals (WTF, Zoo Brew?), and one I am newly appreciative of. There’s a stage with what I’d broadly call live “semipro” music. None of he bands I’ve seen have been remarkable, but they are a nice complement to the festival’s relaxed vibe. There’s usually an eclectic food cart area, too … everything from falafel to African food. In short, it’s the kind of beer festival that could only happen in Portland.

There are more interesting beers on tap this year than last, so I’ve had to compile a shortlist.

• Captured By Porches: Invasive Species IPA. This brewery started in the Clinton Street theater, and I haven’t tried an IPA from them yet. Should be interesting, as I hear this brewery steel bootstraps with the best of them.
• Bison Brewing: Honey Basil Ale. I’ve long considered making a Rosemary IPA, so I’m curious to see how basil works in beer. Thai basil might be a nice variant.
• Eel River: Acai Berry Wheat. I know nothing about this apparent health craze, but if you put vitamins in beer, I’ll likely take them.
• Elliot Bay: Hop von Boorian, a Belgian IPA. Love the Belgian IPAs.
• Fort George: Spruce Ale. This ale was brewed with fresh spruce tips gathered by brewery staff in the manner of Lewis & Clark. Can’t wait to try it, as I really, really like these guys. Check out our video interview and you’ll see why.
• MateVeza: Yerba Mate IPA. I bought a bottle of their better-known Yerba Mate Pale awhile back, but a friend drank it before I could. Maybe it was fate telling me to try a hoppier version.
• Nelson Brewing: Paddywhack & After Dark. File these under “maybe.” I enjoyed my trip to Vancouver, B.C. last year, but the beer wasn’t very impressive, and each bottle I brought back has held down my low opinion of the beer quality in our Northern cousin.
• Oakshire: Watershed IPA. Don’t know much about this brewery, but I’ll try almost anything once.
• Roots Gruit/Rotating Tap. I really hope the rumors about Roots closing aren’t true. I hope to get a taste of the medieval style of fruit beer and the answer to that question if I see Craig Nichols, Roots’ co-owner.
• Sam Smith: Cherry Ale. Also in the “maybe” column. As in, “maybe one of my friends will try it and save me two tickets.” Saw this at QFC the other day and was tempted, but I fear it may be a sugar bomb.
• Standing Stone: Double IPA. Hard to go wrong with this one. See our video interview with the brewer here.
• Upright: Reggae Junkie Gruit & Seven. I’m ashamed to admit it, but I may be the last beer geek in Portland to try Alex Ganum’s newest incarnation. Open-fermentated beer!
• Widmer: Teaser XPA. Call this a bonus. I’m generally a fan of Widmer’s more experimental efforts.

The Weather Channel’s predicting a high of 84 today, which sounds like perfect beer drinking weather to me. Hope to see you there!

Being a generous person, I brought it to a weekend gathering and shared it with Dave and Thom, we didn’t exactly have the ideal glassware, or glass at all really.

There is so much to like about this beer, visually the packaging is great and the color and the head on the beer are enticing. Taste-wise, I would say the beer is very well-made, true to the style, has nice banana and clove flavors woven in and it really hides that 10.2% ABV, not overly alcoholic for such a big beer at all. However, when it comes to tasting, we noticed one small thing, it’s kinda boring, there’s nothing that really makes you say “Wow, I got to try some more of that!”  It’s somewhat like the Toyota Camry of beer. Well-made, precise, reliable and a bit of a snooze. I just wish there was a little something in there that made me want to come back for more.

Speaking of Redhook, not sure how much is left and if it’s at all Trader Joe’s, but the other day i found 22 oz. bombers of Double Black Stout for $1.99 a bottle. I left one on the shelf at the 39th and Holgate store because I didn’t want to be the jerk that cleaned it out. At that price, if you like stouts, it’s worth seeking out at other TJ’s.

Just to show how little I know about what’s going on at East Burn, they also have their version of a Brewer’s Dinner called Beer Belly Dinner.  This month features Jamie Floyd from Ninkasi and something grilled.

And if you’ve never been to East Burn, I highly recommend heading down to the basement and checking out the skee-ball game and all the other great games, it’s like the rec room I never had growing up….or now for that matter.