Brewing in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest Fred Eckhardt
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Brewing in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest Fred Eckhardt Oregon craft brewing began in Toronto in Canada. He had started work- California and Washington ing in brewing in 1945 at the age of 15, because older men were all serving in Oregon/Washington's original and most the war and not available for such work. successful brewer was Henry Weinhard, who founded one of the territory's first Grant began to put his operation togeth- brewing establishments. In 1856, he er in the fall of 1981. He wasn't worried carried his 300-gallon copper brew kettle about the reception of his product. He across the country. He probably started kept his job with SS Steiner, and simply by brewing steam beer. In 1928, deep in brewed the beer he liked; offering it for the Prohibition, his Fort Vancouver sale. The beer he liked was Grant's Brewing (WA) merged with Arnold Blitz's Scottish Ale, and the brewery offered it company (OR) to form Blitz-Weinhard for sale in their location at 25 North Front Brewing in Portland. They were very Street, in Yakima, on 14 July 1982. successful in the post-prohibition era, Grant's Original Scottish Ale, 1982, until they finally found themselves OE/OG 13.5P/1055, alcohol 5.7 (volume) making the same yellow industrial brew and 43 IBU (international bittering units). that the BudMillerCoors group excelled The brewery building, the old Yakima in. They were bought and sold several Opera House, was one of the oldest in times, today owned by Miller, their beer is Yakima (1889) and had also been a brew- currently being produced under contract ery before prohibition. Yakima Brewing by Full Sail in Hood River. The beer is and Malting remained in operation there much better these days than it has been until 1990, when a new facility was for several decades. constructed on Presson Place, with a brewing capacity of 15,000-barrels/ Bert Grant, the first successful non- 465,000-gals/ 18,000,000hl per year and Californian micro-brewer, took a different which was later enlarged. That brewery tack in 1981. Bert, was a quality control was, until recently, owned by Washington expert and Technical Director for SS Winemaker Chateau Ste Michelle. Their Steiner Hops in Yakima, Washington. product was not at all up to Grant's Grant was a recognized Master Brewer standards. Grant died in 2001; they who had been trained at the University of closed the brewery in 2005. 48 Journal of the Brewery History Society Grant also opened a brew pub, in the In 1983, Grant offered cask ale to his train station and was the first brewer to repertoire when he presented his serve cask conditioned ales in North Scottish Ale, in that style, at his Yakima America since well before prohibition. Brew Pub that year. Today, there is an Grant, was famous for his assertive well annual cask ale festival: Chicago Real hopped beers. Actually, he was such a Ale Festival, at Goose Island Brewery hophead that he always carried a vial (gooseisland.com) in that city. Other of hop extract with him to brighten up areas (Seattle) are also following suit in the prosaic brews he encountered at that area. gatherings of the Master Brewers Association or the American Society of Brewing Chemists. He is reported to have Red Hook added a few drops to a glass of Budweiser in the presence of Augie Meanwhile in Seattle, a group of 20 Busch IV, to that personage's great investors, including Starbuck's Coffee consternation. Grant was well known impresario Gordon Bowker put together for his forceful opinions concerning his a microbrewery in a renovated transmis- beer. sion shop in the Ballard district. The result was an odd tasting brew - that from the strange yeast strain that brewer Cask conditioned ‘real’ ales reintro- Charles McElvey (a former mainline duced to North America Seattle Rainer brewmaster) had imported from England. The new beer (OE/OG A lovely painting, ‘McSorley's Bar’, by 13.5/1055, alcohol 5.8% (volume) and John Sloan in 1912 shows beer engines 18IBU (international bittering units), with behind the bar at McSorley's old (1856 it's strange taste profile, soon devel- New York) saloon. This is proof enough of oped a love-hate relationship among the existence of cask beer in the U.S. and Northwest beer lovers. Red Hook (red- of course logic would tell us that anyway. hook.com) was introduced in Seattle on Whether or not any survived prohibition is 11 August 1982 at Jake O'Sheanessey's hard to say. I wasn't looking for such in the Queen Anne district. The Mayor of things in my early drinking days, but judg- Seattle and Washington's governor were ing from my friends' anecdotes of British present to applaud the new beer. wartime beer, it was ‘Warm and pissy’. In Brewery president Paul Shipman imme- those days, Americans were always diately took to the road publicizing his decrying lack of cold beer anywhere in beer; with the result that Grant's Scottish the world they visited (which was actually and Red Hook were often at logger- my own experience in our occupation of heads for the few taps available in Seattle Japan; the beer was too warm for me in and Portland. Consumers, however, were those days, too). quick to appreciate a choice in beer and Brewery History Number 138 49 both brews were successful. Today the each topped with winemaker's fermenta- original, quite distinctive, Red Hook Ale tion locks. has been superseded by a rather ordi- nary Red Hook ESB. Red Hook ranked The ancient bottling line, out of the twelfth in our nation's production in 2007 1930's, was something to behold and at their two locations of Woodinville (WA) never really worked properly. Coury's first (near Seattle), and Portsmouth (NH). The bottling effort (17 March 1980) proved a brewery is now owned (about 25%) by wretched failure. The beer was only Anheuser-Busch (anheuser-busch.com), slightly carbonated as the refrigerating which facilitates marketing across the equipment had failed to chill the beer country. All in all, this represents quite a properly to retain the CO2. The filtration success story. was through a far-too-small cartridge filter one might find in the kitchen sink. The beer itself reeked of di-methyl-sulfate The paths of failure (DMS) and worse. The $1 price tag (high for its day) did not encourage anyone to Oregon's first brewery was started, in try more than one bottle. At this point, a 1980 by Californian Charles Coury, who local law student and home brewer, Tom had started Oregon's first vinifera winery Burns, walked in the door seeking part and was bought out by his partners. time employment. Coury named the new brewery Cartwright Brewing after his wife Shirley's Tom Burns was able to persuade Coury family. Coury's winemaking expertise to change two things: they went to pro- was of little assistance as a brewer and ducing bottle conditioned beers higher in he spent over two years producing and alcohol content; and they increased the promoting a beer that had little going hop levels in the beer. Now the beer was for it. His initial goal was to make a at least carbonated and the heavy hop ‘mild ale,’ a beer with a low taste profile, levels covered whatever deficiencies which could compete with Portland's were to be found in the beer itself. Blitz-Weinhard. His equipment was ancient and makeshift. The brew kettle The original Cartwright Portland Beer was an old steam-jacketed dairy vessel had a gravity of 11.2% fermentables as was the ‘mash tun.’ The mash tun (11.2-Plato/1045 gravity - from 2- and 6- had a makeshift wooden false- bottom row barley malt and crystal malt), an alco- strainer and (worse) the mash stood hol content of 4.3% by volume and about overnight before running off in the 18 bitterness from Cluster and Cascade morning. The brew-size on this venture hops. The final brew was stronger, 12.3- was 330-gals/1250hl, about 145 cases. Plato, 5.2% alcohol and about 40 bitter- The fermenters were retired stainless ness. It was, in fact, quite acceptable if steel 50-gal/190litre Coca-Cola barrels, you got it fresh. However, the months of 50 Journal of the Brewery History Society marketing bad-tasting beer had taken its as a brewer. He had lost all the money toll. When the new ‘good’ beer came out from the sale of his share of the winery, most people were afraid to try it. notable for the fact that it was the first American winery utilizing European- To make matters worse, that summer style Vinifera grapes to start Oregon's was one of the hottest on record and by flourishing wine industry. He and Shirley August the brewery's ambient tempera- left Portland, older and poorer, but wiser. ture had climbed to almost 80F/27C; Coury's mistakes were many, but most which proved to be disastrous for the important, he brewed the wrong beer, beer's ferment. Worse, Coury released aimed sales at the wrong people and much of it to the public. Tart beer may be failed to maintain quality control in the popular in some parts of the world, but crucial early stages of his operation. He sour beer in Oregon, at that time, was may have also been too early on the another matter. The brewery's fortunes market; but he had fatally failed to appre- went steadily downhill after that.