It’s a little hard to believe, considering all the news from 10 Barrel Brewing Company over the past year, that they’re still only going to produce about 25,000 barrels of beer in 2015—a tiny percentage of Deschutes Brewery’s output. If current trends continue, though, those numbers might rapidly approach each other soon. At a press […]
beer
Elevated Drinking
Cory Forster, brewmaster at The Bakers’ Brewery in Silverthorne, Colorado, is high every day of his life. It’s not an unusual state in this ski-resort town of 3,800, an hour west of Denver. But it’s not because of some debilitating drug habit. It’s because Silverthorne is 9,035 feet above sea level. Forster, who worked for […]
Beer Festival of the Gods
It’s seven on a Friday night and the scene around the Deschutes Brewery pub is one of controlled chaos. People from Bend and beyond line up to try some of the new brews off the pilot system, including a smoked gose, a sour Belgian-style quadruple ale, and a variant of Black Butte Porter aged in […]
Fresh Hop Season Begins Early
Hops, if you’ll pardon the easy pun, are hopping around here. It’s been a challenging summer for growing something that requires as much attention as hop vines—harvests across the region are taking place a good week or two earlier than usual this year. But the hopes are still flowing, and local brewers can’t get enough […]
Mamma Mia, Another Pizza Place
Can there ever be enough pizza in the world? Or, even enough pizza joints in one town? With the opening of the very fine, very friendly, and absolutely creative Pacific Pizza in Bend, the answer is most certainly: no. And, yes, there certainly is room for another pizza place in Bend—and, it is likely that […]
Bend Brewfest: The Cheat Sheet
Ladies and gentlemen, get your livers ready. Run a couple extra laps around the block. Invest in a good water bottle. Maybe some pretzel necklaces, too. It’s gonna be a long weekend. Bend Brewfest is back, kicking off at noon sharp on Thursday and running (or staggering, depending on how much you indulge) all the […]
Kickstart Your Beer
Rat Hole Brew Pub, the small taproom and Southwestern restaurant tucked into an unassuming corner of the Old Mill District, is expanding. And they’d like your help. Earlier this week, Rat Hole—named after the storage barn on the outskirts of Bend where brewers Al and Susan Toepfer built their 2.5-barrel brewery—put up a page on […]
Letters 7/14-7/21
LIGHTS OUT, SAVE BIRDS Every spring and fall an extraordinary migration passes through our city, mostly unseen. Millions of birds fly overhead navigating, with great precision, using the starlight, landmarks, and the earth’s magnetic field. Many are songbirds such as warblers, thrushes, tanangers, and sparrows. Their journey is long and hard, but they continue on, […]
The Great Oregon Summer Beerfest Crawl
Summer is flying by, but the beer festival season is, if anything, just kicking off. Next month is gonna be hopping locally, of course, with the big annual Bend Brewfest unfolding across the Old Mill August 13-16 and the Little Woody barrel-aged beer-and-whiskey festival pouring closer to downtown just two weeks later. (Pro tip: Volunteers […]
It’s Hot, Let’s Drink
July may be Oregon Craft Beer Month, but given the painfully hot weather around the region lately, Bendites can be forgiven for wishing this month passes as quickly as possible. But, like it does for many of life’s other annoyances, beer provides a solution. Summer seasonals are all over the bars and shelves right now, […]

