Gresham Light
4th Street Brewing Co.

 

When I order a light beer such as this, I try to remind myself that it's supposed to be a minimalist beer. Sometimes they're lagers, often they're ales as with Gresham Light. But their purpose is to lure away macro drinkers and appeal to the undiscriminating palate. I drink them purely for purposes of research and documentation, but occasionally they display some appeal.

Gresham Light scores points for having a lateral head formation in a pattern depicting Mt. Hood. It's somewhat secondary to the Virgin Mary on a corn tortilla, but it's the best you're gonna do on a Friday night at The Black Roots Bar.

This is also one of the clearest beers I've ever seen. It is clear not merely for it's enthusiastic filtration, but because the pale, watery yellow color hardly contributes any visual substance to begin with. It looks like remarkably pure, yellow tinged water.

And the taste is not horrible. Yes, it's dilute and minimalist and blasé. And the low carbonation does little to enhance what few beer qualities Gresham Light does possess. But it is clean and reasonably functional in meeting one's expectations for a light beer. And if you search for it, the bittering, though shallow, is actually well presented.