Visiting Portland (2023)

It's now been a decade (woah!) since it became clear that this forum could use an "I'm visiting Portland, where should I go?" thread. While the spirit of this thread is to help those visiting Portland decide which spots to visit with their limited time in the city, it's certainly not an exhaustive or authoritative list, and opinions as to what should be included (or not included) in this post will vary. There are tons of other great beer options in Portland that are not included in this original post, so this thread can be a spot for that discussion as well.

Some well-regarded Portland breweries & brew pubs you might consider visiting:
Away Days Brewing
Baerlic Brewing
Breakside Brewery
Cascade Brewing Barrel House
Chuckanut Brewery P. Nut Beer Hall
Great Notion Brewing
Ex Novo Brewing
Little Beast Brewing
Ruse Brewing
Upright Brewing
Wayfinder Beer

Some highly recommended beer bars & bottle shops:
APEX
The Beermongers
Belmont Station
Bridgetown Beerhouse
Horse Brass Pub
Imperial Bottle Shop
John's Marketplace
Loyal Legion
Roscoe's
Saraveza

*Many of the breweries and beer bars/shops in the lists above have multiple locations.

(A Few) Beer-centric Restaurants:
Grain & Gristle
Higgins Restaurant
Interurban
Lardo
Ranch Southeast
Stammtisch
White Owl Social Club

**Just about any decent restaurant in PDX has a good-to-very-good beer list, but the ones listed above go above & beyond. However, this is definitely not an exhaustive list of restaurants with great beer selections. Eater PDX is a great food resource.

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Need shippers for all the beer you bought?
Portland Wine Storage
Rose City Wine Vaults & Storage

Portland Airport
PDX is a great bar that just happens to be an airport. If you have time to kill, there is a Deschutes Brewpub (concourse D), a Hopworks brewpub (concourse E), a Henry's Tavern outpost, and several other restaurants with good tap lists. Deschutes, Hopworks, Henry's, and Country Cat are all past security and all fill growlers, so you can get a fill and carry it on. There are also Made in Oregon stores and a Timberline Lodge gift store past security with good bottle selections.

Disclaimer: This post is not intended to be a catch-all for Portland beer establishments. There are literally hundreds of well-regarded beer institutions throughout Portland and the greater Portland area -- many of which are not listed in this post.

 

Updates to this thread for 2023:

* New intro paragraph for the 10th anniversary (!!) of this thread
* Removed Hair of the Dog Brewing (RIP)
* Added Away Days & Chuckanut
* Updated Loyal Legion’s web address
* Added a note that many of the breweries & beer bars/shops listed now have multiple locations

Some old threads if you want to take a walk down memory lane:
Original thread
Update 1 (winter 2013)
Update 2 (spring 2013)
Update 3 (summer 2013)
Update 4 (fall/winter 2013-14)
Update 5 (spring 2014)
Update 6 (fall/winter 2014)
Update 7 (winter 2015)
Update 8 (spring 2015)
Update 9 (summer 2015)
Update 10 (fall 2015)
Update 11 (winter 2016)
Update 12 (spring 2016)
Update 13 (summer 2016)
Update 14 (fall/winter 2016-17)
Update 15 (summer 2017)
Update 16 (fall/winter 2017-18)
Update 17 (spring/summer 2018)
Update 18 (fall/winter 2018-19)
Visiting Portland (2022)

 

It's actually a bit easier now that I'm only updating it yearly instead of 3-4 times a year. Plus, I really pared down the first post starting with last year's, so there's way less editing, link verifying, and adding/deleting. Helps that there are now 10 years of historical threads to look back on as well.

 

I was in the neighborhood last weekend, so I stopped (or rather tried to stop) at the Gorges Beer Portland brewery/taproom. I hadn't been there since it was Coalition. I remember Coalition being small, but having a bar and some tables. So I was taken aback when I walked into Gorges and there were just three small tables and a counter to place orders. No bar. There is a lot of unheated & uncovered outdoor seating, but that doesn't do much good this time of year. We ended up leaving since the inside tables were taken.

Anyway, just a word of warning for anyone considering a stop at Gorges, particularly when it's cold and/or rainy.

 

You may already know this, but Upright is right across the street from the Moda Center. It's a great spot to pre-game. Enjoy your trip!

 

And if you're going to be at GoW, might as well go across the street to Eem and get some white curry. And then a couple blocks down from Eem is Alefire taphouse. It's pretty under the radar, and I was skeptical when they opened (they're a beer bar / hot sauce shop), but they've always had a great taplist and good selection of beer-to-go when I've been in there. Not to mention an insane amount of hot sauces, if that's your bag.

The main challenge for @BarrelAgedG is to not black out before he gets to the game.

 

I've never waited, but I usually go solo and sit at the bar. I did go with a group of 4 on a Saturday this past summer. We got there right at open and were seated right away. There's probably still a wait at peak times, but I don't believe it's a crazy as it used to be.

As an aside, they had two Great Notion beers on tap last time I was there.