Firkin Fest 2011 – Portland Style

Just about a month ago you heard me talk about my fourth Firkin Fest in Minnesota. Yesterday was my first Firkin Fest in Portland, at the Green Dragon. The two were vastly different in number of firkins and number of attendees but this one held its own.

Going into the festival I was skeptical how far my $30 ticket and the eight six-ounce tasting tickets that came with it would take me. However with only a three hour window to drink I figured that might end up being just about right and leave me in a better place than the all-you-can-drink style of festival. As it turned out there were only 22 firkins rather than the 30 the event had touted so between Mag and I we were able to sample the majority of offerings.

Top Three Beers

• Brewer’s Union Local 180 Au Naturel, a one grain, one hop 3.2% ABV session beer that would be perfect on a warm summer day
• Vertigo Brewing Oatmeal Porter, a 5.6% wine barrel aged porter
• Issaquah Brewhouse Contraband IPA whose 60 IBUs packed a wonderful stank

Beer festivals are about the beer, but there are always other aspects that can make or break the experience. This one had two that made it memorable.

#1 – Having a brewer/owner pouring his beer

One of my favorite parts of the day was talking with Ted Sobel, owner and brewer of Brewer’s Union Local 180. The lack of brewers or very knowledgeable brewery representatives pouring at festivals has been one of the most disappointing things about festivals I’ve been to in Portland to date. For reasons I’ve yet to understand, there are generally clueless volunteers manning the kegs. I don’t mean clueless as a slight against these folks, as I’ve volunteered myself, but clueless due to the OLCC rules outlawing drinking while pouring. So if the person pouring hasn’t had the beer before, or this particular version of it, they are little help other than their ability to convey liquid into the sampling vessel.

#2 – Glass sampling glasses

I understand that glass glasses pose a multitude of hazards that the widely used plastic handled mugs don’t but c’mon, does it not occur to anyone how vastly different the experience is when drinking quality beer out of glass is? Plastic is for keggers full of non-discerning folks who will happily slurp up plastic glass after plastic glass of BMC. Give craft beer lovers some credit, and an appropriate glass to sample out of.

All in all, I’m happy to say it was $30 and three hours well spent.

Firkin Fest 2011 - Minnesota Style

As luck (or the work of the Beer Gods) would have it, a work trip to Alabama fell on the days preceding Firkin Fest and I had the opportunity to layover in Minnesota before returning to Portland. This is the fourth year of the festival and I’ve been there since the beginning. For those of you that haven’t, a quick recap of how it started to give you some perspective on where it is now.

Year 1: I’m pretty confident in saying the festival, held the Sunday of St. Patrick’s Day weekend, was an afterthought and simply a way to generate some additional revenue inside the tent (that likely wouldn’t have been taken down by the rental company until Monday) The Happy Gnome had erected in their parking lot. It was small (about 20 firkins), but not bad for the first time around.

Year 2: While larger (about 60 firkins), the festival still seemed to be a St. Patrick’s Day hanger on. That was ok; it was still fun.

Year 3: This was the first year it seemed like the festival was starting to stand on its own. Unfortunately, standing on its own also seemed to mean there wasn’t enough cash to rent a sufficient number of port-a-potties and since there was no cap admission, there were far too many people there.

Now that you’re caught up with the first three years, onto Year 4. This year the festival was clearly its own event. Held a week and a half after St. Patrick’s Day, for the first time on a Saturday instead of Sunday and finally, finally one entrance fee for as much as you wanted to drink (no more dealing with those pesky tickets for each sample) it seemed like things were coming together. The organizers were expecting over 80 firkins this year and as a response to the crowding issue from the previous year, they said they were capping the number of tickets they would sell.

That all sounds pretty good, doesn’t it? They’re addressing all the issues of the past and bringing in more firkins. I wish I could say, “Yes, in the fourth year, Firkin Fest was a roaring success!” Unfortunately I can’t and here’s why:

• Although someone apparently budgeted for more port-a-potties, there were still not enough. Beer is the focus of a beer fest, but dang, you can only drink so much before you have to make room for more!
• The festival was sold out and however many tickets they sold out of were entirely too many. By 2:00 pm (VIPs got in at noon, general admission started at 1:00), the place was getting uncomfortably packed.
• The overall quality of the beer seemed to have diminished. Don’t get me wrong, I had some mighty fine beers but I got the sense that the emphasis was more about increasing the number of firkins over the previous year. There were certainly fewer beers I was super excited about.

That doesn’t mean I didn’t have a good time. In fact I had a GREAT time! However, my great time had much more to do with the friends I went with and the many, many friends that I have missed since moving to Portland who were also there than what the festival offered. (And here’s the shout out to Joe, Tom & Tom!)

For those of you in Portland who decided to read about a festival in MN that you’ll probably never attend, thank you. I’m excited to attend the firkin fest at the Green Dragon in April to see how it stacks up. See you there!

Firkin Fest 2010

The day after a beer festival is always one for reflection, be it prompted by someone else (“So how was the beer fest yesterday?”) or on one’s own. For yesterday’s Firkin Fest, I’d say pretty good, overall, but there were a few glaring points that put a damper on the whole thing.

Glaring Point #1 – Someone who was organizing the event made the very, very poor choice not to purchase/rent barcode scanners. Many people purchased their tickets in advance, online and brought their barcoded tickets to the event. Checking people in should have been a quick and simple procedure but no. Instead of using the barcodes as intended, the people doing the checking in had to go through the attendee list to verify tickets by last name, which not surprisingly, resulted in a very long line and an unacceptable wait to get in.

Glaring Point #2 – Another poor decision was to only bring in 5 port-a-potties. I don’t know how many people attended, or were anticipated, but 5 port-a-potties was in no way going to cut it. In past years there have been two to three times that number. Thankfully, this was remedied part way through the fest as additional units were brought in.

Glaring Point #3 – There were just way too many people there (so maybe it was good that line to get in was so long that some people simply left). I understand wanting to do well financially on an event, but it got really packed inside the tent and quite a few of the firkins were blown much earlier in the festival than I would have anticipated.

Now, enough of the gloom and doom (maybe better phrased as “ways to improve next year’s fest”) and onto the beer. And there was some REALLY great beer to be had!

Favorite Beer #1 – I’m gonna have to go with the crowd here and agree that Lift Bridge’s Chestnut Hill: “A La Nutsack” was the best of the fest. And I couldn't describe it any better than Jill did with her “Nutella in a glass” description.

Favorite Beer #2 – Goose Island Citra Hop IPA really surprised me. With the exception of some of their specialty beers, I’m generally lukewarm about Goose Island brews. This one however was a wonderfully grapefruitty hopped brew.

Favorite Beer #3 – My third favorite isn’t technically a beer, but a cider from Fox Barrel Cidery. Bonnie was not only tasty, and a redhead, but a sassy one, too. “Bonnie is the kind of girl who handcuffs you to the bed.” ‘Nuff said.

Festing the Firkins

Yesterday's Firkin Fest at The Happy Gnome was quite impressive. They had something like 66 casks of beer, compared to around 20 last year. And the brewer turnout was great. They may have had more firkins than the real ale tent at the Great Taste of the Midwest. The set up and overall format worked well also. $1 a ticket basically got you one sample. Here's what I liked and didn't like about the event.

Liked

• The two special tastings, Thornbridge Jaipur and Ola Dubh (Special Reserve 30) from Harviestoun, were more than worthy. I was especially impressed with the Ola Dubh. Hands-down my favorite beer of the afternoon. The Jaipur was great as well, but I kept finding myself comparing it to American IPAs, which does no justice to English ales and is shameful on my part.
  
• Well, I already said I liked the fantastic selection. I was very happy that our local heros were present, including Brau Bros., Flat Earth, Lake Superior, Lift Bridge, Schells, Summit and Surly. But I was also delighted to be able to get Dark Horse, Avery, Rogue, etc. Colorado was very well represented, and rightfully so, with Boulder Beer Co., Breckenridge, Flying Dog, and New Belgium, in addition to Avery.
• Sprecher had a Scotch Ale that was interesting. I didn't actually care for it, but the emotional response it illicited was interesting. The description Scott gave it was spot on, which is why this is a high point. He described it as the smell and taste of an ocean breeze mixed with seaweed. That fit it exactly.
• Kris and I also had a chance to re-try our first ever sour beer. A couple of years ago, we had a sour from New Belgium that we both agreed tasted like stomach bile. Interesting, but we didn't enjoy it. New Belgium had their La Folie on cask yesterday and we both tried it again. Our palates have evolved a bit since our first tasting. It is still quite tart, but I kind of enjoyed it. Kris didn't like it. Of course, if it isn't Duchesse de Bourgogne, it's crap in her book.
  

Didn't Like

• 1 oz pours just plain stink. I'm gonna pay $12 for a 12 oz. beer normally? In some cases, yes. Some cases. I know you're trying to make money and I won't begrudge you that. Heck, I support it. You wouldn't do the event if you couldn't make money. Makes sense. But c'mon, 1 oz pours!? Hell, and I'm not a tight-ass. I would've been willing to pay a bit more per ticket for a 2 oz. pour. 1 oz pours...sheesh. Didn't care much for $2 beer programs either.
• Some beers just don't work well in Firkins. I was disappointed in a few beers I had. I love Rogue, but didn't care for their Charlie cask. There were a few others that I normally like but that I didn't think worked in a firkin. And, inexplicably, the gold medal winner from the judges went to Two Brothers. Two Brothers makes some damn good beer, but their winning selection was blaise in my opinion. There were far more worthy beers available. I think Lift Bridge's crowd-judged gold meal Farm Girl Kimono was well deserved.
• Live music - meh. Live music is okay, but not when it is too fricken loud and about five feet away from you. We left after the live music began because you couldn't chat with anyone anymore.
• Why weren't there brewpubs represented?
  

Overall - a nice event and a great way to kick off spring. Thanks Happy Gnome.

Warming up for Firkin Fest

Man, I hope Kris and I didn't spoil ourselves for Firkin Fest today. We had some friends come over to play games and drink a few beers. Normally game playing and beer drinking are done with my old stand-bys and favorites like Two-Hearted, Dead Guy, Summit EPA, Singletrack, etc. But not last night.

Last night turned into a Surly night. We pulled out growlers of 16 Grit and Coffee Bender, both of which were still well carbonated and hadn't lost a step (or gained a step, I guess) flavorwise. We then followed up with bombers of Darkness and Southern Tier's Jah-va. Not to be outdone, our friends popped open a bomber of Ommegang's Three Philosophers.

Needless to say, the games degenerated into giggling and burping and scratching the dog's drooly head.

Anyway, I don't know how the hell I didn't get Firkin Fest on the event listing to the left. No matter. You should be going to mnbeer.com for that kind of info anyway.

Firkin Fest - Well Worth the Hangover

Well, from my perspective, the Happy Gnome's Firkin Fest was a success. And I think Kris, Kat, and Scott would agree. I didn't mind, at all, that it appeared Firkin Fest was an afterthought from the St. Patty's celebration the day before. I mean, they already had the tent up and porta-potties primed. The crowd was pretty small and well mannered. For $20, I got more to drink than I really needed on a Sunday...or any day for that matter. And Kris and I got to see many friends. $20 got you 16 tickets (1 4 oz. pour per ticket) plus an additional ticket you could use to get a sample of Surly 2. Of course, I don't think anyone actually paid attention to whether or not you gave a ticket per drink. Kris' favorite beer and the one I thought was most interesting was Summit's Oatmeal Stout made with Belgian brettanomyces (yeast). The yeast gave the beer a distinctive, and not unpleasant, cheese smell. The flavor was pretty interesting as well. Of course, I'm not sure if it was supposed to smell like cheese, but then again, I'M not supposed to smell like cheese, but who cares? I was happy to hear that many of our beer friends at Firkin Fest are also going to be at Gitchee Gumee.

Of course, we couldn't just stop at Firkin Fest. We decided to head up to Barley John's after Firkin Fest to take part in their anniversary celebration. They had a nice fire going to take the chill off the March Sunday and, of course, I stood too close to it. There was a nice crowd there and we saw many faces from Firkin Fest. And we continued to drink. Oh boy.

Needless to say, my headache is finally gone but the heart-burn still rages. Good times...good times.