Welcome to the Neighborhood: PUB, PDX Bottle Shop and Sellwood Cycle Repair

 
All things beery just got a whole lot better down here in the little old Sellwood/Westmoreland neighborhood.  Until just recently the only real craft brew presence was Lompoc's Oaks Bottom Pub, which is a very fine establishment that serves fine Lompoc beers as well as guest taps.  They also have, as long time readers are well aware, in my opinion the finest pub fish and chips around. 

But most craft beer adventures take me far afield (well, okay, not that far), particularly two pursuits: home brewing and sampling rare and imported beers.  The first always leads me to Steinbart's and the second to Belmont Station. Both generally require me to hop in my car, something (given my long commute) I loathe to do. 

Now, happily I shall have a local alternative for both.

The Portland U-Brew and Pub (PUB) on SE Milwaukee (across from DQ) in Westmoreland is a home brew supply shop, a brewpub and a brew-for-yourself-on-our-equipment place.  They have been working to completely renovate the space for months and months and are now finally open!  I hope to check in on them this week, but I am immensely grateful to have a place nearby to dash off to when things go arse up in my homebrewing (which they do far more often than I like to admit).  I also look forward to their careful selection of taps.

 
The Portland Bottle Shop on SE 13th just across and up the bock form Grand Central sent me a card to say that their grand opening will be on Saturday (June 18) from 1 to 8pm.  They promise both beer and wine (unfortunate, in my opinion, I prefer that they focus solely on beer but given the demise of our local wine shop, I understand) a selection of beers on tap to enjoy there or to take away in a growler.  They are still hiding behind papered up windows, but I have high hopes.

And since I am in a welcoming mood, it is also worth mentioning the new store just across from the Portland Bottle Shop, the amazing Sellwood Cycle Repair.  These guys are the best and are longtime neighbors who have relocated to a space that is ten times bigger than their old shop on SE Milwaukie.  The new shop is gorgeous and they are now open - just in time to give my bike the old once over as I prepare to ride around to the new beer haunts.  And don't let the name fool you - this is now a full service retail store, chock-a-block full of bikes and equipment. 

I have full reports on all three places (well, mainly the two beer places) soon.

Beer is Good for You

...according to Cynthia Sass, MPH, RD. Here are her reasons for saying so:

It slashes heart disease risk
All alcoholic beverages, including beer, have been shown to boost HDL, the "good" cholesterol, lower LDL the "bad" cholesterol and thin the blood, to reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke. Moderate alcohol consumption, which is one 12 oz beer a day for women and two for men, has also been linked to a lower risk of type 2 diabetes and improved brain function in older adults.

Beer offers unique benefits compared to wine and spirits
In the Nurses Health study, over 70,000 women ages 25 to 42 were tracked for the link between alcohol and high blood pressure. The study found that those who drank moderate amounts of beer had lower blood pressures than nurses who drank either wine or spirits.

It may help reduce kidney stones and boost bone density
In published research men who chose beer had a lower risk of kidney stones compared to other alcoholic beverages, possibly due to the diuretic effect combined with beer's high water content. Other studies show that compounds in hops may also slow the release of calcium from bone, preventing it from forming a stone. Likely for the same reason, moderate beer drinking has been linked to higher bone densities among women.

Beer contains vitamins, minerals and surprise: fiber!
A standard 12-ounce lager contains just under 1 gram of fiber and a dark beer just over a gram. And in general regular beers contain several B vitamins. A 12-ounce brew also packs more calcium, magnesium, and selenium (a key antioxidant) than a serving of wine.

But Guiness is especially good for you, according to Lisa Bramen on the Smithsonian.com blog:

[The claim that Guinness is good for you] was eventually bolstered by the fact that Guinness contains iron. Pregnant women were even advised to have an occasional pint. Of course, it would take something like a dozen pints a day for a woman to get her recommended daily allowance of iron, in which case the alcohol and calories would cause more harm than good.

But another health benefit was discovered in 2003: stout beer like Guinness (as opposed to lager and other light beer) is high in the antioxidant compounds called flavonoids—similar to those found in red wine, tea and chocolate—that can reduce the risk of heart attack from blood clotting. Researchers at the University of Wisconsin carried out laboratory tests on dogs (Irish setters, I wonder?) with clogged arteries, comparing the effects of Guinness and Heineken. Only those dogs fed Guinness had reduced clotting.

So start drinking stouts and get healthy! I wonder if this includes all beer made with dark malts? If so your hop heads can quench your thirst and heal you body with the now numerous Cascadian Dark Ales.

Brazilian Craft Beer

At last, I finally got my hands on some craft beer from Brazil!  It was not easy, as most bars and restaurants (as documented here) are tied to one of the mega breweries.  Here is a typical scene from a night out in Brazil - it is with a cell phone camera, sorry, but it captures the essence of the beer experience awaiting most visitors to a Brazilian bar or restaurant: pale, light pilnser without any real pilsner character.  [This, by the way, is a great pizza place in Sao Paulo, despite the fact that only Antartica beer is on tap: Margherita Pizzeria]  The beer is suited to the climate: it is light and refreshing for the hot humid days that typify lots of the country for most of the year.  But it does not have much else going for it.

So I headed down to Galaria dos Paes and lo and behold, there I found Baden Baden and Colorado bottles.  These are 20 ounce bottles and with the very strong Real each cost about $10.  Ouch.  This makes it especially hard to catch on - it is a super-luxury good.  Oh, and apparently beer in the bottle is pasteurized even at the craft level so these bottles probably have suffered from this and the heat.

Anyway, the Baden Baden Golden is just that - golden.  A very pretty beer and one immediately notices a very strong smell and taste of honey.  It was a bit much to my taste - slightly heavy and sweet - but upon reading the label it is not honey that is giving this taste but fruit.  They don't specify which, but I am guessing they use local tropical fruit.  If so, I give them big props - craft beer should be local beer and the sue of native ingredients is precisely what Brazilian craft brewers should be doing.  Taking old world techniques and recipes and transforming them into something local and unique is the way to go. Though slightly heavy to me, the Baden Baden Golden is very well crafted, there is no doubt, it is well balanced, pretty in the glass and wonderfully aromatic.

For a northwest hophead, finding a 7% ABV IPA in Brazil was a real treat.  And the Cervejaria Colorado Indica IPA was a fine example of a NW-style IPA (that is a little bigger than an English IPA).  Exceptionally well crafted and balanced, it lacked in exactly the areas your would expect: being so far from the fine fresh aromatic hops fields of the NW it has all the appropriate bitterness but not quite the aroma and floral/citrus taste we have come to associate with out local products.  Still it is an exceptional IPA and would be at home among the better NW IPAs.

My only chance to drink these beers was while watching the final weekend of the Campeonato Brasileiro where Fluminense of Rio won their game through a nice goal by Emerson (of course) and captured the championship.  As my flight was later that night, I could not drink too much, but I ended up drinking a lot of the Indica and less of the Golden - so in my own personal preference set the Indica won, but on another day who knows?

If I were a craft brewer in Brazil, I think I would be concentrating on making lighter beers (for example pale ales and pilsners) both with better quality and taste and with local adjuncts.  A great example of the latter is Wailua Wheat from Kona - a standard wheat beer with a beautifully subtle touch of passion fruit.  Teaching Brazilian beer drinkers to appreciate quality and different beer drinking experiences it the way to start.  It is hard for me to imagine most beer drinkers in Brazil jumping to Indica.  It seems Baden Baden and Colorado are both following this strategy.  I, of course, jumped to the big stuff, which is what caught my eye, but browsing their selection it seems both are making lighter and accessible beers: Baden Baden mostly lagers and Colorado mostly ales. 

They are even starting to make an international impact, each with a few international awards to their credit.  Hopefully, more will make it for export.  If they can make beers that use local ingredients to great affect then they can offer the world a new experience and perhaps make a good export business.

One of the great experiences I had this time in Brazil was an amazing meal at a restaurant called Mani that serves nouvelle Brazilian cuisine: local fresh ingredients used to perfection to create an amazing taste sensation of local flavors like coconut, passion fruit, banana, manioca, white beans, hearts of palm and on and on and on.  If Brazilian brewers can tap into this same flavor palate and create light fruity and surprising beers, I think they can really catch on worldwide.

I wish them luck and next time I'll know where to find them.