Monday, August 24, 2015

Berts Growler Garage in Ontario, Oregon

Although, not located in Idaho, Ontario is part of the Treasure Valley and also includes the Beer Valley Brewing Company owned and operated by Pete Ricks.

My wife and I had the opportunity to visit Berts on Friday, August, 21st.  We were very impressed with the 50's style decor.  With the checkerboard tiled floor and the old fashioned diner style stools and chairs, it has the charm of a time gone bye.  The Garage has 3 vintage vehicles inside and there is plenty of seating for large groups.


We got to meet the owner and operator, Michelle Bertalotto.  Michelle is knowledgeable about the local craft beer scene and seems to have a knack of finding those rare highly sought after beers.  Did I mention that they have food!  Good food, but I am here to talk about the beer.  Because Berts in in Oregon, they can offer beer that is not available in Idaho.

The picture below shows the beer that we took home Friday Night (We actually took home 6 bottles of Dogfish Head 90 minute IPA  plus 2 growlers of Barley Browns Beer in addition to those shown above).  Notice the variety of Dogfish Head Beer and the Pelican Mother of All Storms. Make sure to click on the photo see see the large version.



Michelle also had a case of the nostalgic Tim Batt's Snake River Brewery's Amber Lager on display.
Twelve bottles still full of beer in the case.



We highly recommend this venue.  Well worth the short trip to Ontario.


P.S. The reason we were at Berts was for a meeting with the Ontario based Malheur Mashers Homebrew Club.  If you live in the Ontario Area and you homebrew, join this club.  They had a great education presentation from Jack.  He raised 2-row barley malt to make his beer, so we learned how to raised the barley, harvest the barley and malt the barley.  Kudos to Jack for the in depth presentation.  Malheur Mashers Facebook Page.



You can find Berts on the internet:

Wednesday, August 5, 2015

IDAHO BREWERY COUNT FROM 1984 TO 2015

IDAHO BREWERY COUNT FROM 1984 TO 2015

Just a little summary and a chart showing the phenominal growth of the number of local breweries in the state of Idaho.  From Tim Batt's Snake River Brewing just west of Caldwell, Idaho to Powderhaus Brewing just west of County Line Brewing in Garden City, you can see how far we have come in a very short time.  Sixty Five Breweries have opened in the last 31 years and fifteen breweries have close in that time.

OPENED CLOSED TOTAL
1984 1 0 1
1985 0 0 1
1986 0 0 1
1987 2 0 3
1988 1 0 4
1989 0 0 4
1990 0 0 4
1991 1 1 4
1992 0 0 4
1993 1 0 5
1994 2 0 7
1995 2 0 9
1996 3 0 12
1997 0 0 12
1998 1 2 11
1999 1 0 12
2000 0 0 12
2001 0 1 11
2002 1 0 12
2003 2 2 12
2004 0 0 12
2005 1 0 13
2006 1 0 14
2007 1 0 15
2008 4 0 19
2009 3 1 21
2010 2 2 21
2011 5 1 25
2012 7 1 31
2013 5 0 36
2014 11 3 44
2015 6 0 50
Totals 65 1550

Click on the Chart
To see a larger version

Click here for the complete List of Idaho Breweries