Trekkychick

for a limited time only, more available than your average man

But a good beer is comparatively easy to find, especially if you live in Portland, which boasts more breweries per capita than any other city in the United States. So while you may not find the perfect man, the perfect craft beer may still be within reach.

If you’re wondering what makes a craft beer crafty, let me assure you that it has nothing to do with arts and crafts, which is quite a relief for someone such as myself whose 7th-grade arts & crafts teacher told the class my self-portrait looked like an alien (I thought it was a compliment—-I love science fiction—-until she flunked me), nor is a craft beer the kind of beer you drink to get over the trauma of being called an alien by your 7th grade arts & crafts teacher. Rather, a craft brewer is small (producing less than 2 million barrels of beer annually) and independent. And while 2 million barrels may not sound small to the last person who tried drinking 2 million barrels of beer, it is nonetheless relatively small when compared to a craftless beer corporation such as Anheuser-Busch, whose production well exceeds 100 million barrels annually. Most importantly, craft beers can be absolutely delicious, whereas I bet you’ve never heard someone say, while sipping on an Anheuser-Busch creation, “Oh, this Bud Light is absolutely delicious!” unless he was in a Superbowl commercial.

If you’ve yet to try it, my first suggestion is Sierra Nevada’s Summerfest lager. For those of you not familiar with Sierra Nevada’s beers, their most popular standard brew is probably their pale ale, and their winter offering, Celebration Ale, is definitely worth the celebration. Even their stout is far and away the best stout in a bottle I’ve yet to try. Their Summerfest lager is light (5.0 ABV) and hoppy without being overpoweringly so. I’m not typically a huge lager fan (I’ve heard they cut down trees), but this is a lager that appeals even to environmentally-friendly darker beer lovers such as myself.

If clearing forests isn’t your style, another craft beer to write home about (for me, I guess that would be the alien home planet from which my arts & crafts teacher thinks I sprouted) is Deschutes brewery’s 2010 Once a Decade Ale, which is more like Nine Times a Decade Ale for me when I add up the number of bottles I’ve purchased over the last few months. Vaguely reminiscent of a barleywine-style ale but without that sickeningly sweet finish, the Once a Decade Ale (also known as Jubel 2010) is 10% ABV, aged in oak pinot barrels, and is my favorite craft find of the year. And much like finding a good boyfriend, you won’t find another beer quite like it for at least a decade, so stock up on a few before they’re gone for good and break one open every couple of years to temper the dry spell. Speaking of opening your beer, the biggest trick to the Once a Decade Ale is its wax-dipped cap, which can be troublesome to open. I began with more conventional methods such as using a standard bottle opener. But when mainstream methods failed me, I panicked and resorted to biting, clawing, stabbing, and coaxing, while my roommate finally found success melting down the wax with a lighter. However, I’ve since seen effortless cap removals with your tried and true average bottle opener, so perhaps it was just me. It usually is.

So while choosing the right boy may be challenging, choosing the right craft beer is entirely possible—-if you’re fortunate enough to call Portland home.

–Troi out