Forgive me, Beer Geeks, for I have sinned. Maybe that's being a little dramatic but earlier this week I did finally cave to the pull of $1 happy hour beers at Splash Bar. As you may have read about over on The New School, Splash Bar offers pints of their house beers - currently three of them - for a mere $1 during happy hour and $3 the rest of the time. So with a little time between their 5pm opening time and dinner plans with friends I stopped in.
Going in I had set the bar pretty low in my mind for what the beer would taste like and a first glance at the surroundings, beer pong tables set up for play and a shot bus just inside the entrance, didn't do anything to improve my expectations. Nonetheless I was there and I promptly ordered up the first pint - Tiger pale lager. It shouldn't come as a surprise that it's quite similar to a beer of the same name from Asia Pacific Breweries. For a buck, sure, I'm in. Perhaps even for $3 although I'm pretty sure it would be a weird experience to be at Splash Bar after the end of happy hour when the age of the target market would leave me feeling older than I want to.
Since Mag was joining me I ordered up a second pint, Jaws IPA. This is not your typical NW IPA; instead it's a mild version and apparently it's specifically designed to be more approachable for a crowd that probably doesn't get into hops the way you and I do. Again, exchanging one dolla for a pint of it is an acceptable transaction. However between the pale lager and the IPA I have a slight preference for the lager. I'd rather either have the hops be there or simply drink something where they aren't expected to play a prominent role.
While we could have finished those two and split the third house offering - Lava Hound Hefeweizen - we decided to shove off to meet our dinner companions. Perhaps I'll stop back sometime when I'm in the area to try that or something else they've brewed up. If you're nearby, feeling thirsty but not particularly discriminating give it a try. You've probably spent considerably more to be disappointed by at least one other beer in the past.
Somehow we've made it nearly to the end of September which means the holidays aren't far behind. Whether you're thinking it might be wise to rein in the beer spending a bit or thinking ahead to showing visitors that we not only have amazing beer here but you can get it for amazing prices, here's a round up of deals on pints and growlers.
Mondays
$2.50 pints at Fire on the Mountain (3 locations), Lompoc Tavern and Lompoc Oaks Bottom
$3 pints at Migration Brewing
$1 off pints at Culmination Brewing
$8 growler fills at McMenamins (all locations; beer chosen by each location)
$10 growler fills at Culmination Brewing
Tuesdays
$2 pints at Base Camp (on select beer until keg blows)
$2.50 pints at Lompoc 5th Q and Lompoc Hedge House
1/2 price pints at EastBurn
$3 pints at Alameda, The Hoppy Brewer and all Rogue Meeting Halls (tiki shirt required)
$10 growler fills at Fire on the Mountain (3 locations) and PDX U-Brew
1/2 price growler fills at Portland Brewing with regular menu item purchase
Wednesdays
$3 pints at Burnside Brewing and PDX U-Brew
$8 growler fills at Mad Greek Deli and Occidental Brewing
$10 growler fills at PDX U-Brew
Thursdays
$2 pints at Portland Brewing (after 6pm)
$2 pints at Laurelwood Brewing NE in Brewers Den (after 3pm, one beer until the keg blows)
$2.50 pints at Mad Greek Deli (after 6pm)
$3 pints at Carts on Foster Pod Bar
$9 growler fills at Pints Brewing
Fridays
2-4-1 growler fills at Portland Brewing
Saturdays
$6 growler fills at Alameda Brewing
Sundays
$2 pints at The Standard
$3 pints at Sparky's Pizza (SE Belmont)
$8 growler fills at Migration Brewing
Daily
$2.50 pints at Martha's inside Revolution Hall (4-6pm)
$3 pints at all Lardo locations (3-6pm)
$3 pints at Sizzle Pie (4-7pm)
$3 pints at My Father's Place (M-F 4-6pm, 10pm-12am)
$7 growler fills at Hot Lips Pizza (after 8pm)
$9 growler fills at 39th Mini Mart (SE 39th Ave; on selected beer of the week)
$9 growler fills at Carts on Foster Pod Bar ($12 for cider)
I'm sure there are a few similar deals on pints and growler fills around town that have gone undetected by my radar. If you know of any ($3 & under pints/$10 & under growler fills), leave a comment and I'll add them to the post. Your fellow drinkers thank you.
Last updates made 7/22/2016
I've talked about happy hours before and the focus has been on how inexpensive one can purchase a beer, a good craft beer, for. While I still love being able to spend a mere $2 or $2.50, I recently visited two places suggested by and with a friend. Although these places don't offer discounts on the beer the happy hour food is spectacularly priced. And it's not "cheap food" but really tasty food and not the two-little-bits-on-a-plate variety either.
The first is tucked away in NW Portland, tucked away at least for this SE dweller. Rae's Lakeview offers happy hour daily 3 - 6 pm with the only beer special being $1 bottles of Miller High Life. The happy hour food menu however boasts 16 options all priced $2 - $5, including a cheeseburger and Croque Monsieur for $5 each or biscuits & gravy for a mere $2. On our first visit we ordered and shared a majority of the offerings and on my last visit I had to give the biscuits and gravy a try. I found all of them to be tasty and enough of a bargain to offset the non-discounted beer prices (about $5 each).
The second, while not tucked away, is located in a restaurant and bar heavy area. One might walk or drive by it a dozen times without even thinking about stopping in. The place, Jake's Famous Crawfish, is a part of the McCormick & Schmick's family of restaurants but that doesn't mean they don't offer a hellava happy hour food menu. Their happy hour, also 3 - 6 pm daily, has dishes that range from $2.95 - $5.95. I can't speak to as many of these dishes mainly because the Northwest Seafood & Sausage Gumbo that I ordered and the Jake's Cheeseburger that Mag ordered turned out to be full sized meals. And they were only $3.95 each. Oh yeah, did I mention that the Tillamook cheese-topped burger was accompanied by a mound of French fries? Well, it is. The beers were similarly priced to Rae's ($5 - $6) and again, the delicious, filling food at rock bottom prices offset the full priced beers.
Finally, while we're on the topic, a quick reminder that for inexpensive beer, and only slightly higher happy hour food prices, there's the White Owl Social Club in SE. If you missed my post about it last month you can check out all the details here. Are there other places with similar happy hours I should be checking out?
Last weekend I met up with a friend to get the latest pair of bottle cap earrings she had crafted for me. In the course of our conversation she mentioned that she'd recently been to the White Owl Social Club where their happy hour included $2 pints and tasty food. Not one to pass up an inexpensive pint, especially one so close to my inner SE abode, it only took three days from hearing about White Owl into visiting White Owl.
Housed in a black corner building on SE 8th between Madison and Main, the space had been known by multiple names in the past, most recently Plan B. I had never been to Plan B although I did recall walking by it during a visit to a few distilleries in the area mostly because it seemed like such an odd name. So while I don't know what it looked like before I can say that the impression the solid black exterior gives (divey) is incongruent with what is inside. The interior, while modest in size is clean and contemporary, if a bit dark, with a combination of tables, booths, bar seating and an outdoor, covered patio.
Hunkering down at a booth and taking a look at the menu it was clear that my friend had not led me astray. Indeed, happy hour is offered everyday from 3 - 6 p.m. with all of their draft beers $2, potato boots are 2-for-1 and burgers are $5. The beer was the primary draw and I was not disappointed in the 10+ offerings with Migration Black Hearted IPA and Stone Ruination particularly catching my eye alongside brews from Boneyard, Upright, Oakshire, Ninkasi, Cascade Lakes, Deschutes, Hopworks and Double Mountain.
Being that we were there during happy hour we decided we should give the food a go, too. Potato Boots (loaded potato skins) can be made to order but we chose to go with the premade combinations of "Southeast Style" and "Gresham Style." Both were quite tasty as were the buffalo burgers we ordered a short time later. They aren't gigantic 1/2 lb burgers but neither are they the barely there "burgers" you get at a drive through. The non-happy hour price of $9 might be a bit steep but for $5, they're well worth it.
It was a good visit (with none of the service issues noted on some Yelp reviews) and a place we'll likely be returning to soon, often or both. If you've checked it out I'd enjoy hearing what you thought of it. If not, make plans to stop in soon.
For a good look at the place, check out Thrillist's slide show.
