It is my first time in the dove gray ultra-hip interior of the Teardrop Cocktail Lounge on NW Everett Street. The bar holds the center of the floor here, with not only attractive bartenders and your standard liquor bottles, but also an intriguing display rack of darkly tinted bottles. The menu says they are herbal tinctures and bitters.
By now it is common knowledge: The River City has a cocktail scene with few rivals across the country. Our best bartenders are as well-known as our best chefs, our latest and greatest watering holes are written up in The New York Times, and some, such as Mint/820 owner Lucy Brennan, are even writing books on the subject.
Perhaps what is most unique about Portland’s cocktail culture is its availability to everyone, not just the socialites with wads of cash. House-infused liquors, micro-distilled spirits and cocktails that have never known corn-syrup based mixers can be found in every quarter of the city, in all types of bars.
At the Teardrop, many cocktails on the menu feature ingredients you’ve probably never heard of, let alone tasted in a drink. An example: The Fair-Weather Friends drink includes Rittenhouse rye, eau d’amis, grapefruit juice, lapsang souchong black tea, and is garnished with a pink peppercorn rim. Don’t Google “eau d’amis,” nothing will come up besides links to the Teardrop and a French MySpace profile, but it translates from French into “friend’s water.”
Before this night, I had never tasted foie gras. Now my first sampling of the swanky morsel would come not as a bite, but a sip. The “Freedonia” cocktail at Teardrop features foie gras infused armagnac (a type of brandy). And yet for all the glitz and unpronounceable ingredients, kids in baseball caps are sitting alongside Pearlites in Prada.
Bizarre, enticing and extravagant cocktails may seem at first guess to be an anomaly of Portland’s tonier spots, but the trend is spreading.
Belly Timber serves up bacon-infused bourbon. Jam on Hawthorne makes their Sassy Mary—a local take on the Bloody Mary—with lavender infused vodka and locally made Secret Aardvark habanero sauce. The 20-something east-side playground Eastburn creates twists on classic cocktails made with locally distilled alcohols and infusions. Whatever your price range or choice of venue, Portland’s bartenders are doing their damnedest to make you ditch your rum-and-diet habit.
North of the Teardrop at the Carlyle, 26-year-old Jacob Grier mixes me up an amber colored cocktail called a “Martinez” from a recipe dating back to the 1870s. It is warming and sweet without being cloying or sugary.
“Portland has some of the best mixologists in the country but without the feeling of exclusivity you get in some other places. We don’t make our drinks in speakeasy theme bars or charge $15 for a cocktail,” says Grier, newly transplanted from the Washington, D.C., area. “Getting a well-crafted cocktail here isn’t a special occasion—it’s just the way things should be.”
Grier, who began tending bar at the Carlyle just this January, says he was drawn to the West Coast after a visit to San Francisco in 2007 opened his eyes to a new way of doing things behind the counter. Back East, Grier says as he deftly mixes up a pale green drink called a “Last Word,” most bars stick to beers and standard mixed drinks.
“Portland shares this focus on fresh ingredients and quality spirits [with San Francisco], and thanks to cocktail blogging and the Oregon Bartenders Guild I knew there’d be a great community waiting when I got here,” Grier says. “Our booming distillery scene also piqued my interest, and it’s a great place for beer and coffee, too. When it comes to drinks, this city has it all.”
The citywide cross-class interest in quality cocktails makes perfect sense to Portland State German major Jared Meador, who says cocktails and a sense of individuality are the hallmarks of the city.
“That’s what Portland was founded on,” Meador says, “Drinking, gambling and sex.”
His friend Myrrha Kammer says she completely agrees, and adds that Portland’s way of mixing drinks is part of what makes the city so great.
“I have been to bars in every major city in this country,” says Kammer, an interior designer, “and by far, the best martinis I’ve had have been made in Portland.”
The credit cannot entirely be placed on the bartenders in Portland, however. The city boasts no less than eight craft distilleries within city limits alone, with several more scattered throughout western Oregon. Integrity Spirits, House Spirits and New Deal, to name a few, have set up shop in southeast Portland in what is commonly referred to as Distillery Row.
At the Carlyle, Grier crafts a cocktail he’s created based on the Scandinavian-style anise and caraway flavored liquor. As he deftly constructs the drink, he explains every ingredient. In addition to Aquavit, he adds Fernet-Branca, an Italian spirit created in 1845, some Cointreau and a dash of orange bitters. He mists the top of the cocktail with orange zest oil and tells me the drink is named a “Horatio,” a clever reference to the character from Hamlet who says he is “more an antique Roman than a Dane.”
The Horatio is an addictive, herby drink that exemplifies exactly what cocktails in Portland are all about: ingenuity, great taste, and a Liberal Arts degree.
If you haven’t had a chance to sample the full spectrum of Portland’s liquid bounty, not to worry. The craft distillery market has been projected to continue growing in the coming years, and if the region’s response to local beer and wine is any indication, that most likely means we’re a mere season or two away from a Taste of Portland: Micro-distilled Spirits festival.
Well, one can pray.