10.27.2009

Come Celebrate Halloween at the Fort George Hellorium!!!





The Blair Street Mugwumps






The Blair Street Mugwumps
Sunday, Nov 1st
8pm No Cover
Fort George Brewery
1483 Duane St.-Astoria
www/myspace.com/theeblairstmugwumps

From Eugene, Oregon, The Blair St. Mugwumps are bringing their back porch stompin hokum jug band blues to Astoria.
They are self-described as “ruckussy, raunchy and rooted in the Southern dirt” musicians. On uke, banjo uke, banjo, jug-a-phone, duck call, harmonica, kazoo is Reverend Jazzbo Pappy Hamhock, on washboard, kazoo, whistlin is Jobydiah Grizwald "5 Ball" Hudson III, on musical saw and ukulele is Darlin Clementine, on resoponic guitar is Hollywood "Creamy" Sanchez and introducing on washtub bass, Imelda "Cookie" Lamour. The Blair Street Mugwumps are folding their tents after almost four years, lot's of hangovers and several changes in personnel, they are preparing for their final curtain call and the Fort George Brewery is second to last on their tour. Don't miss their playful stage presence and good old time blues this Sunday, Novemebr 1st. The show is at 8pm and there will be no cover.



Lumberyard Grill Brewers Dinner Nov. 12th

Here is the Menu for the Brewers Dinner featuring Fort George on Nov 12th at the Lumberyard Grill in Cannon Beach, OR. For more information visit their website at http://www.lumberyardgrill.com

10.25.2009

Hillfolk Noir




Hillfolk Noir
Sunday, October 25th
8pm No Cover
Fort George Brewery
1483 Duane St.-Astoria
http://www.myspace.com/hillfolknoir


"Whether its the tolling bells of deathbed fevers, the loping swagger of a stranger in town walking down mainstreet as every gunslinger in town stops and stares, or the wagon trains of woe rolling past desolate, arid, landscapes on a breeze of radiation, Ward and his Hillfolkers flow through the last wisps of a world gone very wrong for the protagonist with crooked, receding grins at reapers grim and eager as they transcend the alt.country hokum with a full-tilt-off-kilter medicine show of captivating enchantment that should diffuse beyond the canyons, badlands and sad-swaying hillsides of Idaho."

-Medicine Stu, Maverick Magazine



Hillfolk Noir of Boise, Idaho returns to the Fort George Brewery and Public House on Sunday, October 25th. Travis Ward formed the band in the late 90's playing shows and selling low budget recordings under the name Travis Ward and Junkyard Bandstand. Soon a full time band was formed that toured the North West several times and sold a couple thousand self produced albums. After the Junkyard Bandstand rhythm section moved from Boise to Oregon in search of cheaper groceries, Travis formed a new group.

Hillfolk Noir still plays the old songs, but has a much more reckless sound and more new material than they know what to do with. They've played shows with James McMurtry, Built to Spill, Bonnie Prince Billy, Gerald Collier, Heroes and Villains, Train, Jesse Dayton, the Dusty 45's, Neva Denova, Neko Case, and tons of other great acts that you may or may not have heard of.

Hillfolk Noir recorded the foundation of their new album Diggin' Songs live in a generous friend's tiny North End house. With their amps in closets, drums next to the woodstove, singers in bathrooms, and microphones in every unoccupied corner, the four piece band breathed life into the songs and the characters that meander through them. The production continued in an even tinier garden shack, complete with egg crate soundproofing and a large spider population. With the dark theme of "Digging," these recordings wander out of the sage covered hills through beatnik juke joints, Appalachian swamp shacks, and psychedelic deltas. Exhausted and proud of the finished product, Hillfolk Noir humbly invites you to come into the fog and let your eyes roll back.

Hillfolk Noir's song "Johhny's Last Run" is available on the Flying M's "Coffee Garage Rock" comp. A great compilation of bands including; the Invasion, the Very Most, Paleo, Universal, and tons of others. Hillfolk Noir's song "The Great Grizzly Bear Scare" is available on Tender Loving Empire Records comp-"Friends and Friends of Friends. Another great compilation featuring lots of NW bands.

10.18.2009

Marta live at 8 pm

Sunday, October 18th
8pm No Cover
Fort George Brewery
1483 Duane St. -Astoria
www.fortgeorgebrewery.com
www.musicbymarta.com


Originally from Lublin, Poland, singer songwriter Marta Pacek tours to the Northwest and stops at the Fort George Brewery and Public House on Sunday, October 18th. She was born in Poland during the period of Soviet communist dominance in the early 80's. Her mother, a singer in a rock band and her father an engineer straight out of the Polish army immigrated to Australia where they dreamt of a better life in a counrty where their children could have the opportunity for a brilliant and free life.

Growing up in the 90's in the capitol of Australia Canberra, in a moderately poor household lead Marta to rummage through her parents old vinyl records when half the world was already listening to cd's.

As a restless teen, who struggled with her identity as an Australian immigrant and various religious and cultural confliicts with her catholic parents, Marta found comfort in folk singer songwriters who expressed similair themes of loneliness, sorrow and disenchantment. Artists such as Joni Mitchell, Johnny Cash, Tim Buckley, Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits and Bob Dylan were of high interest. Her obsession with narrative songwriters extended into bands Fleetwood Mack, Traveling Wilburys and The Pretenders who melded pop sensibility nto their folksy tales.

By the time Marta had reached her late teens she had been affected by Australian bands INXS, Crowded House The Divynals and Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Marta has said, "I admired all types of artists: wordsmiths, writers poets, painters, sculpters, screenwriters and of course songwriters., any one who had the courage to say something in a unique way..."

Marta's sound is reminiscent of the 60's San Francisco scene when poetry was rampant. Her music is narrative and thought provoking, sometimes lucid and at other times cryptic. Her tales can be anything from hauntlingly reflective to highly infectious folk/pop songs. They are distinct stories of fear, betrayal, discovery, love found and love thrown away. Don't miss her performance at 8pm. There is no cover charge.


--
AstoriaHideouts.com
FortGeorgeBrewery.com

10.17.2009

Fort George beer dinner at Venti's Cafe, Salem this Sunday

By John Foyston, The Oregonian

October 15, 2009, 12:55PM
jackchrisboard.JPG Jack Harris and Chris Nemlowill in front of the Fort George chalk board, the best in the bizz...

Chris Nemlowill says there are still a few tickets left, so give the cafe a call...this menu certainly sounds worth the drive to Salem, and we know the beer will be sublime.

6-9pm October 18th from Venti's Cafe, 325 Court St NE, Salem;$40, call first, 503-399-8733.



Appetizer: Braised tornado of lamb and grilled salmon mousseline, paired with Vortex IPA

Salad:
Frisee, radicchio, watercress, & arugula, tomato with salt pork lardons and fresh croutons with a Divinity Ale vinagrette, paired with Divinity Ale

Entree: Duck Fat braised short ribs with a lamb and stout beer demi & celery root puree, paired with Cavatica Stout

Dessert: Chocolate Torte paired with Coffee Girl Espresso Stout.

More information here.

Beer Descriptions:

Vortex IPA
India Pale Ales’s were designed to withstand the long voyage to India. Today, it seems one has to design the IPA strong and hoppy enough to make the trip back as well. Vortex IPA is Fort George’s first foray into this strong beer category. With generous additions of Cascade, Simcoe and Palisade hops throughout the brewing, fermentation and conditioning phases, balanced with heaps of organic pale malt, we designed this to not rip your tastebuds off your tongue, but rather vigorously stimulate them and your palate into a lupulinecstacy of pleasure.
During the cross-country truck trip our brewery made to find it’s home in Astoria it was nearly scattered to the cornfields of Nebraska by a tornado. We try to capture some of nature’s intensity in every pint.
If that doesn’t give you some idea of what this beer is about, here are the numbers.
ABV 7.7% IBU 97
Ingredients:
Cascade Hops
Simcoe Hops
Palisade Hops
Organic Gambrinus Pale Malt
Victory Malt
40L Crystal Malt
NW Ale Yeast

Divinity

Brewers use raspberries in fruit beer because they work so well. Tart and crisp, the essence easily moves into the beer without cloying sweetness. The brewers at Fort George were seeking something unique so delved into the O.S.U. Ag department's archives to discover the Olallieberry - a hybrid of Logan and Youngberry, each of which is a cross between blackberry, raspberry and dewberry. Huge and sweet with blood-red juice, yet fragile and easily bruised, these berries never found a commercial market in their whole form, but as a jam, wine and now for the first time a beer they have found Divinity.
5.2% abv, IBU's = (international berry units) off the scale.

ingredients:
Organic Gambrinus Pale Malt
Organic Gambrinus Malted Wheat
40lbs Olallieberry
Hoegaarden Wit Yeast

Cavatica Stout
An immense, bold, black as night, American stout beauty; Cavatica is no dry Irish anything. Made in the tradition of terminator, except stronger, one sip and you will surely take notice to what you’re drinking.
The name honors this brewer’s affinity with Arachnia. Be forewarned, this beer will stain your clothes.
SG @ 1078
TG @ 1012
ABV 8.8%
Ingredients:
8 Different Malts.
Palisade Hops
Mt. Rainer Hops

Coffee Girl Imperial Stout

Russian Imperial Stout conditioned on ten pounds of freshly roasted then french press ground espresso beans from Coffee Girl Cafe in Astoria, Oregon.
This beer was featured on the cover of the living section in the Oregonian on Valentines day 2008


ABV 9.6%

Ingredients:
9 different Malts.
lots of Oatmeal
Tons of Malasses.
10IBLS CG Espresso

These suds aren't duds

Fort George brewers buy Lovell Building, reveal expansion plans

<>By JOE GAMM
The Daily Astorian

Beer is business and business is good.

It doesn't hurt to have really good beer either.

The success that the Fort George Brewery has experienced over the past 2 1⁄2 years has inspired its owners Chris Nemlowill and Jack Harris to take a chance and try to grow.

The business partners (under the business name Big Beams LLC) completed the deal Wednesday to purchase the Fort George Building, the Lovell Building, the old Ocean Crest Chevrolet alignment shop and the Hertz lot all from Robert Stricklin. The properties make up almost a city block.

The brewery owners hope their expansion will help them extend their business into neighboring states and nearly double their workforce.

In its brief time at the Duane Street location, the brewery has enjoyed tremendous success.

"We've had some pretty rapid growth. Locals have really accepted Fort George Brewery as a place they want to come to, hang out and have a beer at," Nemlowill said.

Large groups had inquired about renting out the entire pub, but the business owners didn't want to close the pub to locals and regular customers. They have 150 members in their Mug Club, who they didn't want to ever have to turn away. They knew they needed a bigger space to rent out for large groups or events.

Harris said the obvious next step was to buy more room, "because it's expensive to rent." Though he praised Stricklin as a generous (former) landlord.

Harris said they never considered purchasing all the buildings until Stricklin told them it was package deal.

"It just opened our minds to new possibilities and new opportunities," he said.

They are purchasing enough equipment to triple in size, and want to increase their production capacity. They employ 23 people now, and anticipate the number to grow rapidly with expansion.

Fort George has 26 accounts in Clatsop County. Its beer is enjoyed as far away as Portland.

"We really haven't worked on pushing beer up to Portland," Nemlowill said. But 60 kegs head that far east every month. The brewery has reached its capacity. As the brewery expands, Nemlowill and Harris would like to package some of their products in pints.

The men intend to distribute their best-loved beers throughout Oregon and into Washington, Idaho and California. To reach their goals they need lots of room to expand.

Big beams indeed. And also very big buildings. The second floor of the Fort George Building is nearly 6,000 square feet. Large windows face out of the space on three sides. The brewers hope to open part of the space for customers and to use part to "barrel age" some of their beers in wine barrels. Last year they produced a Bourbon Barrel Stout, and a beer they called South. South was a Belgian-style beer aged on raspberries and "conditioned" in pinot noir barrels.

"Stuff like that is a lot of fun to produce," Nemlowill said.

As big as it is, the Fort George building is dwarfed by the Lovell Building.

In all, the Lovell Building is a massive 30,000 square feet. Its huge old-growth beams are similar to the 400-year-old Douglas Fir beams in Fort George.

The old buildings represent history. Perhaps none more than the Lovell Building, which survived the Great Astoria Fire.

The Lovell Building, built in 1921, was like a second home for Astoria resident Martha Dahl. Dahl's grandfather, Sherman Lovell, had the building constructed for Lovell auto Co., his automotive dealership.

Dahl believes the building was the first in Astoria to be built for the express purpose of housing an automotive dealership.

"This was a state-of-the-art dealership," she said.

But the year following completion of the building, tragedy struck when the Great Astoria Fire destroyed many of the wood buildings that once occupied downtown.

Legend has it that when the fire reached as far east as 14th Street firefighters wanted to blow up Lovell's building so there would be a fire break. Sherman Lovell refused, and stood on top of the building firing warning shots at them.

Dahl said her family has its own lore about the building. She said Lovell had ordered a number of fire extinguishers for the new building. But when the shipment arrived there had been a mixup and instead of a number of individual fire extinguishers, he received that number of cases. Lovell hadn't had a chance to send the extras back.

"His employees got up on the roof. Every time an ember flew, they snuffed it," Dahl said. "The mistake of ordering too many saved the building."

Regardless of how the structure was preserved, after the fire, with so many businesses burned out of their buildings, Lovell moved his dealership to its previous location and opened his new building to other retail businesses, and called it the Lovell Arcade.

"Several of the displaced businesses in town moved in there," Dahl said.

Like her father, Dahl and her siblings worked in the dealership. She eventually managed it until the family sold the business in 1994.
Chris Nemlowill, co-owner of the Fort George Brewery and Public House, plans to have his kegs flowing inside the newly purchased Lovell Building, on 14th and Duane Street in Astoria Oct. 31 when the brewery hosts Halloween Hellorium. ALEX PAJUNAS — The Daily Astorian
Jack Harris, co-owner of the Fort George Brewery and Public House, will have more room to roam and stairs to conquer as the Astoria brewery expands its production and distribution beyond the Fort George Building. ALEX PAJUNAS — The Daily Astorian
•  Brewery customers are going to have a chance to get a first-hand look at the Lovell Building starting at 9 p.m. Oct. 31, when Fort George hosts Halloween Hellorium. The event is intended to coincide with the Gallagher concert and the annual Halloween cyclocross held at the Clatsop County Fairgrounds.

10.16.2009

Drunkin Pumpkin just released!

As we celebrate the fall of summer and the rewards of harvest, a pumpkin beer seems necessary. Fort George Brewers cut up and baked 120 pounds of pie pumpkins and threw them in with the mash. The resulting beer captures Autumn in a glass. A rich Amber, silky-smooth on the tongue with an essence of earth and all it's potential, this version forgoes the traditional use of pie spices so the palate can enjoy the subtlety of the garden, intoxicated with its' bounty.
6.5% abv 99 IPU's (international pumpkin units)



Jack Harris
Fort George Brewery
(503) 325-PINT
jack@fortgeorgebrewery.com

10.13.2009

Our Co-Hoperative is making an apperance at the Eugene Fresh Hop Beer Tastival


10/17/2009
Oregon Bounty
Fresh Hop Beer Tastival
Produced by the
Oregon Brewers Guild
948 Olive St.
Eugene
Admission is free
21+ Only
$5 for a tasting glass-Required to taste.
It’s your once-a-year chance to taste what Oregon’s finest brewmasters can do with just-picked hops. Sample more than 20 fresh hop beers from Oregon’s top craft brewers, large and small. Admission is free; glasses $5 and are required to taste, individual tastes are $1.

10.08.2009

Wild Mushroom Harvest Brewer's Dinner Wednesday Oct. 14th

The shorter days and increase in precipitation bring a smile to my face every October…Mushrooms! October 14 will be the first of six Brewer’s Dinners at the Fort George Brewery. Below you can view the menu. All dinners will be held on the second Wednesday of the month and start at 6:00 P.M. $55.00 will buy you five courses of food with beer to match each course; this price includes gratuity. A $5.00 per person discount will apply for anyone who purchases two or more tickets and reservations are required. We will take a short break in the month of March to prepare for our 3rd birthday party, Sunday, March 14th. Call 503-325-PINT for reservations and more info.
See you there!
- Dana, Head Chef


Wild Mushroom Harvest Dinner

Wednesday, October 14th 2009


Intro

King Oyster Mushroom Duxelle with Blue Scorcher Crostini

Fort George Brewery – Golden Goose


Appetizer

King Boletus and Cavatica Stout Sausages

Served on a Bed of Caramelized Onions

Buckbean Brewing Company - Black Noddy Lager


Salad

Butter Leaf Greens with Toasted Pecan Chèvre Chaud and Quick Wit - Peach Vinaigrette

Dogfish Head Craft Brewery - Festina Pêche


Soup

Smoked Lobster Mushroom Bisque with a Rosemary Gremolata

Stone Brewing Company – Stone Smoked Porter


MAIN COURSE

Morel and Rabbit Pot Pie

Fort George Brewery – Illuminator Dopplebock


DESSERT

Chanterelle and Apricot Ice Cream Sandwich

Weissbierbrauerei G. Schneider & Sohn GmbH - Aventinus Weizen-Eisbock

10.01.2009

Matt Zeltzer


Sunday, Ocotber 4th
8pm No cover
Fort George Brewery
1483 Duane St.-Astoria


Matt Zeltzer tours to Astoria'a Fort George brewery and Public House this Sunday night October 4th. Zeltzer is a blues/roots slide guitar musician from Portland, Oregon. He brings a driving mixture of fierce, bone-shaking slide guitar and subtle finger-picked folk. The stirring texture of his guitar is tied with highly poetic lyrics and a soulful, seemingly timeless voice: reminiscent of an earlier generation of folk music, yet standing alone as a unique and contemporary expression. While Zeltzer's talent is bordering on masterful, it is the intense energy, vibrancy, and unusual honesty that transform Zeltzer's music into compelling and profound art.

Raised in the smoggy settlements outside Los Angeles, half way through his life, Matthew’s family relocated further North, where endless cities give way to suburbs, farms, and finally the Pacific Ocean. Just shy of 14, Matthew took up surfing and electric guitar, thus extending a lifelong relationship with music (and the sea). Matthew now lives in Portland, Oregon, between traveling off of the map, in search of a world hidden beneath the Formica veneer of the disposable age.

Zeltzer has been traveling backwards for as long as he can remember. “ I grew up listening to The Beatles, Buddy Holly, Neil Young, Bob Dylan and Bob Marley out of the tape deck in my parents Camery wagon.” Eventually, his interests led him to the blues, and later folk music, from Buddy Guy, Howling Wolf, and the Band, and back to the likes of Son House, John Lee Hooker, and Lightnin’ Hopkins. Zeltzer has been playing music for nearly his entire life- after fiddling with the family piano and a guitar he received “around age four”, he began taking piano lessons at age eight, shifting his focus to guitar later. In the age of throwaway college degrees and text messaging, it is rare to find a young, well-developed artist such as Zeltzer. Already, at the age of 22, Zeltzer has released an EP, two demo CDs, played guitar on The Flying H’s EP “Shake It Out Loud,” and performed at numerous festivals, such as “One Family Gathering,” venues, benefit concerts, house shows up and down the west coast and in Hawaii— Music starts at 8pm and there is no cover charge.
www.myspace.com/mattzeltzer