Sometimes we can forget how freakin’ cool it is to have a Deschutes Brewpub in downtown Portland. Not long ago, you’d have to make the three hour trek out to Bend to get your paws on some of the exclusives that are now just a hop, skip, and a jump away. Even better, too, is that now that there are more locations, this means more tasty one-off Deschutes’ brews in general.

This week, as usual, we rolled into Deschutes Portland and were gladdened by the presence of some interesting new brews.

As you are probably aware (seeing as how you’re a beer geek reading this), there’s a lot going on craft beer-wise in Cascadia during the month of March. Really, there’s always a lot going on here. It seems the fun never ends. Here’s three can’t miss events that we recommend you attend for the love of great beer.

March 13 Double Mountain 3rd Anniversary Party

One of Hood River’s top three best breweries, Double Mountain, has been turning heads and captivating palates big time. Now just three years deep in the game, they’re throwing a blow out not to be skipped. Starting at noon on Saturday March 13 and lasting until 11PM, there will be lots of great DM beer, an array of great live music, and delicious food. All this under a heated tent outside of the brewpub. Read more at our earlier post here. We’ll see you there!

Brewpublic interviews Nick Arzner founder and brewer at Block 15 Restaurant & Brewery in the cellar of the old Gazette Times Printing Press where some dynamic barrel-aging is underway.

More from our cellar sampling:

The brewers at Astoria, Oregon’s Fort George Brewery and Public House are getting ready for their expansion. This week, head brewer Jack Harris headed to Houston, Texas to acquire a 30-barrel brew system from Saint Arnold Brewing Company, Texas’ oldest craft brewery who are amidst some incredible expanding of their own. Right now five trucks loaded with the barrels and three 1,800-gallon fermentation tanks are on their way to Astoria. The aim is to have the new system up and running by September. This will quadruple the capacity of the current  brewhouse that will soon take over an entire city block by where they are currently located. In other exciting Fort George news, the brewery has announced that with the beefed up production, they anticipate having 16-ounce cans of their Vortex IPA available sometime during the summer of next year.

Oregon Trail Brewery and Old World Deli in Corvallis, OR

Last weekend on our action packed travel to Corvallis, we learned that the college town was about more than just Oregon State Beavers and their prosperous Division 1 sports programs. The seat of Benton County, Corvallis is home to over 50,000 people as well as a thriving craft beer community.

Orange and black lights up the streets where the Beaver faithful seem to never waiver from cheering on their favorite school. In fact Oregon State University offers a Fermentation Science option that is approved by the Institute of Food Technologists program. In recent news, Indie Hops, an Oregon  supplier of aroma hops, donated $807,000 toward a new program for aroma hop research at the university in the College of Agricultural Sciences. In total, the hops merchant has provided over $1 million toward hops breeding and chemistry research. This is not only good news for OSU and Oregon, but it’s great news for much of the North American craft beer community.

Portsmouth Brewmaster Tod Mott

Recently you may have read the New School Beer Blog’s post about the hype surrounding Russian River’s Pliny the Younger Triple IPA. To some, a highly sought after brew such as this should inevitably lead folks to extreme measures. For others, the hype repels those who believe firmly there are equal if not superior brews available that can be more easily obtained. Regardless of what your stance is on such a topic, there will continue to remain a fervent desire to possess such noteworthy specimens.

Relating to this sort of buzz for the next best beer, Portsmouth Brewery of Portsmouth, New Hampshire is preparing themselves for a whirlwind of beer geeks angling for their dibs on the brewery’s most anticipated brew, Kate the Great. Kate is an imperial stout that brewmaster Tod Mott has been making since his first days with the brewery in 2003. In 2007, Beer Advocate hailed the brew, named for Catherine the Great, a Russian Empress of the 18th Century, as the #2 beer on the planet, and the #1 beer in the United States. Mott, a humble brewer with a masters degree in ceramics, has brewed professionally with Harpoon, Commonwealth, Back Bay Brewing, Quincy Ships (where he was a founding partner) and, most recently, the Tap in Haverhill, where he designed and set up the brewing system. Many of today’s modern brewers in New England can thank Mott for his guidance in brewing and name him as an inspiration to their craft.

The much anticipated official opening of Migration Brewing is finally upon us. The brewpub located on Glisan Street at NE 28th (2828 NE Glisan) will open its doors to the public at 3PM today until midnight. Co-founder Colin Rath says “We have a great selection of beers currently and our MPA (Migration Pale Ale) will grace the handles as of one week from today. We just got a TV for blazer games, the sweet 16, Tour De France and the world cup which is just around the corner.”

Double Mountain, one of the best breweries in Oregon and the Pacific Northwest, has just informed us of their third anniversary party (you have to say “par-tay” when it’s this cool).

Double Mountain co-founder Charlie Devereux says “Come on down to Double Mountain and help us celebrate three years of fantastic beers, tasty fare and good times with friends. We pay homage to our great family of fans every March with a big blowout party… It’s our way of saying thanks for supporting us all the year round.”

Another weekend has come and gone. This past one involved Spring-like weather in mid-February, something we are lucky to enjoy here in the Pacific Northwest. The cherry trees blossoming and several others budding made it clear that the coldest and darkest days of winter here are finally behind us. This lends itself to better accessibility to better beer. And, as you might expect, we took full advantage of this golden opportunity.

Friday

Friday kicked off with more of the same fantastic weather that would ensue all weekend long. The perennial crocuses made an appearance to soak up the warm sunshine along with a number of other budding plants that had remained dormant all winter. We enjoyed it the same, opening the glass facing on the screen door to let the warmth of this pseudo-spring in.

Last evening the Brewpublic faithful made our way down to the Green Dragon Pub and Bistro to enjoy a variety of hearty nebulous darks from Fort George Brewery and Public House of Astoria. On this night, Fort George co-founder Chris “Nimz” Nemlowill was on hand with his lovely wife Zeddy and the good folks at Mountain Peoples Distributing to share some sumptuous and sought-after stouts. In a sense, the coastal brewery was bringing a little of their Stout Month with them to a thirsty Portland pack. Zeddy runs a coffee shop on Astoria’s Pier 39 (next to Rogue’s Alehouse) known as Coffee Girl. A special Fort George stout of the same name pressed in a wonderful Ethiopian blend. Also, two versions of Fort George’s Cavatica Stout was pouring on this night: one of which was barrel-aged in bourbon casks. Lastly, an oyster stout dubbed the Murky Pearl gave adventurous beer geeks something to discuss and was a highlight of Fort George’s recent Oyster Dinner Pairing. Lisa Morrison, known also as the Beer Goddess, was on hand to enjoy in the tasting and mentioned a special event for female craft beer lovers known as Hoppy Housewives coming up at Fort George on February 20th. During this event Lisa will educate attendees on brewing, cooking with beer, beer pairing, and provide copies of her highly anticipated new beer cookbook. As far as we know, a few tickets for this event are still available but not for long. A great description of last night’s event can be found at Jason Wallace’s Portland Beer and Music Blog, a great read for folks like us who love pairing the two.