Great Notion has been getting a lot of good word of mouth and I am long overdue to check their place out. It’s crowded, but there’s a place on the rail for me so I take it.
Tonight’s drink, the Blueberry Pancake: half the Double Stack imperial breakfast stout, half the Blueberry Muffin fruited sour. It tastes exactly like a waffle with blueberry syrup on it. The nose is tart blueberry, the flavors a delicious maple with just a hint of the tartness. There’s even an element of waffle-y bready thing happening and I have no idea how they did that. I don’t know if I’d want several of these-it’s skewing a little sweet for my tastes-but I would gleefully recommend the beer to people.
I get this on Steve’s recommendation, although he says that if I really want something tasty, his personal favorite beer is the Papaya Mochi IPA. He’s currently drinking the Blueberry Pancake, however, so we casually agree that this is the thing to stick with.
I mention remembering this place when it was an entirely different brewery, and I can tell from his expression he’s new to the city. Hailing from Wisconsin, he been here eight months and is spending his days off exploring the city, trying to find which neighborhood he’d like to settle in.
There seems to be quite the influx of people from WI, MN, I tell him and he chuckles, saying that most of the people in the Midwest really get tired of the winters.
Soon after, he accidentally knocks his drink over, spilling it towards the patron next to him. He apologizes like he’s a stranger at a party full of roommates; frequently and with great sincerity. But the impacted person laughs it off and is clearly rolling with this just fine.
With what’s left of Steve’s beer I toast him: everything worked out and nobody got hurt.
Turns out, the person he spilled his beer on is also new to Portland, so to speak; she and her boyfriend are visiting from Philadelphia. A short ‘welcome to Portland’ later and they’re gleefully getting information on what other places they should go visit, while recommending some breweries in Philadelphia to me.
We talk a bit about the cultural differences between the East and West coast (or at least the East coast and the PNW) and, like you do with people from Philly, I congratulate them on the Superbowl win. They beam a little and I get the sense that they may not be football fans, but they are definitely in love with Philadelphia.
Today’s second pint goes to Raices.
A pint for Dionysus 