2004 Piluso Pinot noir

The wine lovers at LAD have officially called it. ‘04 Oregon Pinot noirs are ripe and ready to be drunk. I write this after last night’s dinner went from seriously last minute, to seriously memorable. Here’s how it happened…

I’m drowning in tomatoes. In an effort to eat my mandatory daily ration I decided to cook up a quick tomato tapenade for fish last night. While it was bubbling away on the stove, I ransacked my house for a cheap red wine. Pepperwood Syrah… gone. Red Bicyclette… au revoir. By then I was fixated. Fresh tomato tapenade and no red wine is practically a sin, and one I’m not willing to pay the price for. I trudged down to the cellar, the whole while wondering if I could justify popping a bottle of one of my more prized wines on a Wednesday night, with no company. I’ve got a nice little trove of Oregon indie wines that I’ve collected over the last couple of years at the Portland Indie Wine Festival. Granted, they don’t last very long around my house, so I was quite surprised to discover a forgotten ‘04 Toluca Lane Pinot noir…

Here’s where it gets interesting. It was perfect. It had a little effervescence when I first uncorked it, but the nose was beautiful and it was perfectly balanced and full of flavor. It was Oregon elegance at its best, and 30 minutes later it surpassed my highest expectations. I could tell it was at its prime - 6 months or more and it might have been over the hill, but right now it was perfect!

I told my tale at the office today and learned that I’m not the only one who had this ‘04 experience. Last week Lisa popped a bottle of ‘04 Black Cap Pinot noir and knew she’d hit the jackpot. The nose had particularly interesting rose pedal character and the finesse was incredible. It was a stunning example of Jason Lett’s intuitive talent and must be similar to when a surfer catches the crest of a wave — it was a perfect arc of flavor.

Catching a wine in its prime is a sublime experience, and one you wish you could savor over and over again, but it’s that short window of perfection that makes the moment so coveted. After making this discovery, we understood what we had to do. As Oregon wine lovers, we feel it is our duty to ensure that people get the best experience possible. Take our word for it … drink your ‘04 Oregon Pinot noir, and DRINK IT NOW!

Many of you may be wondering why I’m so excited about a “festive winter ale” in September, and to you my answer is simple - have you ever tasted Jubelale? Full of dark crystal malt, it’s nutty, it’s sweet and generally delicious. Mmmm…..

So what prompted this sudden outburst of Jubelale love? Last night Deschutes Brewery held simultaneous Jubelale launch parties at its Bend and Portland public houses, offering a lucky few the opportunity to try the 2008 brewing before it’s release to store shelves in the beginning of October.

In addition to traditional Jubelale the pub was offering a special nitro Jubel and a menu of delicious beer infused options. We tried the “Pig’s Ear” dessert which was similar to an elephant ear (with bits of bacon incorporated into the dough) and came with caramel sauce and a Jubelale ice cream. Pretty tasty.

So, if you’ve got a craving for some Christmas in September, I’d recommend heading down to the pub and getting your hands on some Jubelale before word spreads and you can’t get a stool at the bar.

Kegs

Are 21 year olds interested in beer and food pairings? What’s the best social media platform to reach young consumers? Which craft breweries have the most brand awareness with the youth market?

These are just a few of the many questions we’re trying to find answers to here at LAD comm headquarters. To help us in our mission and to provide more industry insight for our client partners, we’ve developed a new online survey that we’ve sent out to our network of targeted beer-loving consumers.

If you’d like to chime in and give us your two cents, check out our Zoomerang survey here. The survey is quick and easy (it should take about five minutes.) We’re interested to hear your thoughts - but don’t worry, all responses remain anonymous.

*UPDATED 10/1/08: Thank you to everyone who took the time to complete our beer survey.  Due to the high volume of responses we received the survey is now closed.  We’re excited to start analyzing the data and reading your feedback.   Please check back soon, we’ll be posting some of our findings in the coming weeks.

After all of the phone calls, drop ins and questions like, “Is it in today?” Deschutes Brewery’s the dissident release finally arrived! Immediately when the doors opened to the Portland pub this Wednesday at 11 am, people started rushing in to get their bounty of dissident brew. The first person who showed up purchased eight bottles, the next six, and on from there - lets just say, our stash is dwindling. The day was crazy! We were given an allotment of 30 cases from Bend and we already went through 18 cases in one day. People kept coming up to the front desk saying, “I’d like a t-shirt, a pint glass, and umm a case (twelve 22oz bottles) of dissident.”

Earlier on in the day, employees gathered around a back table to open and discuss the remarkable beer. One of the most frequent comments I received from customers was, “I didn’t know you could do this with beer.” Well everyone, you can make a sour brown beer, Bend decided to do it, and it is delicious. It has a very fruity and sharp taste to it that drinks so well and only gets better. It’s true, when you first taste it the immediate reaction is “whoa, beer?” But once your taste buds settle the next inclination is, “whoa, beer!”

The feedback and excitement surrounding this beer release has been overwhelming. We are expected to run out of the cases we received from Bend within the next day or so, and might possibly finish off the kegs by the end of the weekend. Everyone and their grandmother is buying this reserve series. You could tell how far the excitement spread when the general manager announced that Portland pub would be receiving Dissident t-shirts in-stock and all the employees lit up and let out a squished face, hissing “yesssss.”

I have never witnessed something quite like this - everyone who comes in is in tune with the uniqueness and quality of this beer. They are so excited about getting their hands on as much as they can. A dissident spell perhaps? The entire pub from servers, bartenders, hosts, clientele, and customers are all grinning and basking in the release. It has been a whole lot of fun and judging by the excitement and the sales thus far, I don’t know how much longer the fun will last, so be sure to come in this weekend and get the last few drops of Dissident.

–Andrew (from the Portland Pub)

When I was in high school one of my friends discovered she had celiac, an autoimmune intestinal disorder aggravated by eating gluten. After being diagnosed, she changed her diet and was able to manage her symptoms, but on the downside she was unable to have traditional gluten filled foods like bread, pasta, and brownies.

More and more Americans are being diagnosed with the disease. In a recent story, USA Today reported that there are currently 110,000 diagnosed cases of celiac disease in the U.S., up from 40,000 cased in 2003. (You can see the complete article here.)

Because traditional beers are made using malt and barley, beer has long been considered one of the main no-nos of a gluten free diet.

Well, Deschutes Brewery is planning to change that. The brewery has plans to release a new Gluten Free Golden Ale. Using sorghum, brown rice, and roasted chestnuts instead of malted barley or wheat as the sources of extract to avoid gluten, the brewers were able to create a flavor very similar to the crystal malt used in many of their other signature beers.

Although the brewery has produced a small batch of low gluten beer before, the Deschutes brewers were so fastidious in brewing the Gluten Free that they not only double cleaned the brewing equipment, but also grew the yeast culture used to ferment the beer from a single cell using only sorghum as its nutritional source.

Oregon’s celiacs can check out this new hand-crafted brew on draft at the Deschutes Brewery and Public Houses in Bend and Portland at the end of the month. You can check out the complete pub menu here.

Mmmmm, beer.

Downtown Drinking on a Dime

Our mission: To seek out downtown happy hour destinations where we can fill our bellies for $10 or less. The good news is that there are a ton of hot, hip fantastic options. That’s right, a table for two can enjoy cocktails and hearty appetizers and drop a $20.00 plus tip. So come along the LAD happy hour trail and drink up!

Red Star Happy Hour Beer and Food Pairings Under $10!

Places we went:

• 23 Hoyt
• Basta’s
• Carafe
• Clyde Common
• Masu
• Red Star
• Rock Bottom
• Silk
• Southpark
• Ten 01

23 Hoyt:

Here’s the great thing about 23 Hoyt’s happy hour menu: it runs until 7:00. Although I really like a good happy hour, I rarely make it out of the office in time to get somewhere by 6:00 p.m., so a later happy hour always makes me, well, happy. When I first went to 23 Hoyt’s happy hour I was seriously questioning whether it would pass the $10 happy hour challenge. I was expecting small portions and large prices, mostly given the location, atmosphere and clientele. I was pleasantly surprised on all fronts.

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Tales of the cocktail took me to New Orleans this past week.  Hipsters in straw fedoras, legendarily drunk distillers and shit-faced presenters added a ton of color to the already vivid scene but I did manage to uncover somethings outside the programmed debauchery.
What’s HOT NOW in New Orleans?

Patois Pickle cocktail. That’s right, the chef at Patois in Uptown showcases his house-made bread and butter pickles by combining their juice with Hendricks Gin in his signature martini.  This is a dream come true for a salt lover. The hint of sweetness and subtle floral quality from the cucumber gin, creates a wonderful savory quality to this cocktail. It’s a fantastic start to one of the most inspired local cuisine scenes I’ve ever tried.

We tried the rabbit (perfectly fried) with okra (not slimey at all), tomatoes, and kale .  We started with the boiled gulf shrimp with fresh hearts of palm, cucumber ribbons and fresh pea trendrils. This is tossed in a lovely lemon oil.  Kind of a quirky salad that never fully comes together but somehow it’s the inherent odd-ball quality that makes this dish successful.

Skip dessert (the dry fig cake and kefir lime cream should be taken off the menu. It reminded us of having our mouths washed out with Ivory soap — not that we ever deserved that).  And the peach cobbler didn’t deliver on its homey promise. The peaches were ever so slightly undercooked and it really was more of a brown betty than a cobbler.  I’d rather have the alcohol I got from the praline ice cream served on the rocks as my dessert next time.

We also loved Cochon about five minutes away from Patois, also considered uptown but this restaurant is nearer to the convention center.  This is truly a celebration of all things pig.

We tried the livercheese sandwich which was outstanding. Apparently livercheese is NOT to be confused with liverwurst (the more refined version, we learned).  Liver cheese makes New York City street vendor hot dogs seem like very select pieces of meat.  But discerning what’s inside was not our mission. We loved the paté-like chunky quality between two rustic pieces of bagette. The arugula added good flavor but seemed a little too fancy for this sammy.

We also loved the pulled pork served on top of rustic pieces of white and orange turnips.  This was definitely a dish designed for fall but the AC was strong and we needed some more pig. The cracklings on top made the dish.  These unusually large, crispy bits had pieces of meat and fat attached which was a surprise.

Galatoire’s lived up to its legend.  The trout almandine was outstanding.  Nicely coaxed color in the almonds from toasting had fantastic crunch and added good nuttiness to the trout which was on a shallow river of meniere sauce.  

If you want to try another old school place, we learned that the food at Arnaud’s was not all that. However, the bananas foster were classically prepared table-side by a Chippendale’s worthy nice young man.  After the shock of seeing almost a half bag of brown sugar go into the pan, nothing else mattered.

Saturday was toasty in Portland but it was chilly at Patricia Green Cellars patriciagreencellars.com.  We set out to taste through J. Christopher jchristopherwine@msn.com, Andrew Rich’s andrewrichwines.com and Patty’s Sauv Blancs and were delighted by the range of styles and wines.

Our picks:

J. Christopher’s 2007 SB Croft Vineyard ($20) lovely stone-fruit nose, an unusual wave-like thing happened with the flavors, it was as if a chiffon scarf was lifting and falling on my palate.  Overall, it was our favorite of his wines — except it sold out 30 minutes before we left. Bummer.

J. Christopher’s 2007, SB, Willamette Valley ($16) — bracing acidity, grassy notes, perhaps not as interesting as the Maresh or Croft but a really pleasing wine and a great value.

Andrew Rich chats with guests

Andrew’s 2007 Sauvignon, Croft Vineyard ($20) was delicious.  Incredible lychée notes, the aromas seem to leap out of the glass way before you got it close to your nose.  

Patricia Green Cellars 2007 Oregon Sauvignon Blanc ($20) was on the opulent end of the spectrum, with more spice characteristics but still in balance with the ripe fruit flavors.

p.s. I noticed at the buffet, yet another chicken liver siting (this is everywhere right now!). This one had pistacchios (sp?) and raisins.  So good.

Here at LAD, we do take pride in our gourmet tastes, but even the most discerning palate craves good old fashioned Americana sometimes - especially on the 4th of July. To celebrate our nation’s independence day, I threw a backyard barbecue bash that included traditional American fare like hamburgers and hot dogs, but the real excitement came when we pulled out the… prepare yourself for this - Jelloshot Flag!

Putting together this edible edifice of patriotism was much more difficult than one might imagine. Who would’ve thought that when I googled “Jelloshot Flag” my search would come up blank!? Well, I intend to cure that lack of online content and offer up a photo and some tips for success. Because another thing that we take pride in here at LAD is our ability to spot a trend a mile away. I might be ahead of the times on this one, but I’m going out on a limb to predict that by next year Jelloshot Flags will be all the rage! So, take advice from the new expert lest you be asked to prepare one yourself…

Jelloshot Flag: “Top Tips From A New Pro”
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