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Celebrating Oregon Beer
Your fortnightly round-up of all the beer and hop news from the Beaver State.
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Oregon has continued to enjoy summer-like weather deep into October, extending a lovely patio season. But as an anchor to the calendar, we just hit awards season, confirming it is indeed autumn. In this edition of the newsletter, we tell you who won medals for the fresh hop edition of the Oregon Beer Awards, and which breweries cleaned up at the Great American Beer Festival. It once again confirms what a special place Oregon is for beer! |
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- News -
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Grand Fir Expands
Grand Fir, the little brewpub with big talent, is expanding. The project of wife-and-husband team Whitney Burnside (brewer) and Doug Adams (chef) will open the Grand Fir Outpost along Highway 224 at the edge of Happy Valley and Damascus.
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Migration Also Expands
Migration announced plans for their latest pub in NW Portland at 2035 NW Front Ave. The new place will feature a menu of pizza, along with a full bar and of course, a lineup of Migration beer.
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Kobold's Vault Closed
Kobold Brewing's The Vault Taphouse in Redmond has closed. Drinkers and partner food trucks learned of the closure when they found a sign on the door. The owners said they plans to resell the taproom as is, though, so a new beer venue may replace it.
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Oktoberfest Draws Millions
In heartening news, Munich's Oktoberfest celebration drew 7.4 million visitors in 2026, up from 6.5m last year. That made this year's fest the most visited in its history. The fest also served 6.7 maß (liters) of beer, or 57,000 US barrels.
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Crooked Creek Growth
The New School has an in-depth look at Columbia County's only brewery, St. Helen's Crooked Creek. Writer Neil Ferguson details how the brewery has flourished even during a tough time for the industry. It's also a heartening read.
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Oregon Beer Awards: Fresh Hop Beers
Each year, a special edition of the Oregon Beer Awards takes place in early October, when judges evaluate seasonal fresh hop beers. This year three breweries managed to score two medals, making them the fresh hop champs of 2026: Breakside, Ruse, and Sunriver. Congratulations to all the winners!
Pale Ales and IPAs
- (Gold) Sunriver Fresh Coast Hospitality
- (Silver) Sunriver Fresh Whammies
- (Bronze) Breakside Fresh Hop Bayside IPA
Hazy Pales and Hazy IPAs
- (Gold) Fort George/Ruse (collab) Quality of Consciousness
- (Silver) Little Beast Little Green Men
- (Bronze) Brujos Fresh Hop Populus
Other Fresh Hop Beers
- (Gold) Breakside Fresh Hop Summer Classic
- (Silver) Ruse Red Rain
- (Bronze) Hetty Alice Fresh Hop Italian Pils
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- Upcoming Events -
Please send us all your upcoming event information at the following email so we can include them in our weekly roundups: events@celebrateoregonbeer.com.
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Oregon City Turns 12
Oregon City Brewing hosts its 12th Anniversary on Saturday, October 24, at its original location. The daylong event will feature its house brewed beer, and tunes from four bands starting at 3:30, including: Dogheart, Lucas Benoit, Suntex, and Night Heron.
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BrewLights
This BrewLights beer festival (21+) returns November 13-14 at the Oregon Zoo. With an animal lantern train ride, vibrant sparkling tunnels and a variety of wildlife-inspired displays, BrewLights is the region’s most impressive light display--with beer!
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Spotlight: GABF Winners
Earlier this month, the Great American Beer Festival (GABF) announced the winners in their annual beer competition, and once again, Oregon, with 1.2% of the U.S. population, won 32 medals for beer (34 including cider). That's 10% of all medals awarded. In terms of gold medals, it was even more impressive: Oregon won 17 (16%) of those.
The GABF is the most prestigious American beer competition, and judges evaluated over 7,200 beers and ciders from 1,300 breweries and cideries. Oregon has consistently been among the most winningest states, generally following just California (with nine times the population and three times the number of breweries) and host-state Colorado, whose breweries do not have to ship their beers and can deliver them days before the competition. In terms of beer awards, Oregon beat Colorado this year by a single medal for the first time (though their cider wins gave them more total medals). Have a look at Oregon’s recent performance:
- 2025: 29 medals, one best brewery
- 2024: 38 medals, three best brewery awards
- 2023: 25 medals, no best breweries
The Winners
Given their medal haul, it is not surprising that Oregon breweries also won two of the eight "best brewery" awards, which are given to breweries of different sizes:
- UPP Liquids (250-500 barrel category, Bend). They won three gold medals, a silver, and a bronze. That makes ten medals in the two years UPP has existed, and two best brewery awards to boot. Impressive!
- Breakside Brewery (15,000-100,000 barrels, Portland). Breakside won six medals this year, including three golds, and that brings their total to 37. This is their first best brewery win.
You can see the full list at this link, including each winning beer, but we need to acknowledge all the winning breweries here: 10 Barrel (Bend), Alesong (Eugene, 3 medals), Bend Brewing (2), ColdFire (Eugene), Deschutes (Bend, 2), Falling Sky (Eugene), Grand Fir (Portland), McMenamins St Francis (Bend), Oregon City Brewing, Pelican (Tillamook), pFriem (Hood River, 2), Sunriver (3), Wayfinder (Portland), Worthy (Bend, 2), and Zoiglhaus (Portland).
Of Special Note
A few breweries accomplished extra special feats that deserve special mention.
- With their three medals this year, Alesong has medaled in every year since 2016 when they were founded, an incredible streak of consistency for the Eugene brewery specializing in barrel aging.
- Bend Brewing achieved the unprecedented “Oregon Triple Crown.” Their hazy IPA Because Science took the gold medal at this year's GABF, following up its 2026 golds in the same category (hazy IPAs) at the World Beer Cup and the Oregon Beer Awards. Such an incredible feat may never happen again.
- Zoiglhaus got pretty close, though, winning two out of three golds in the triple crown with its Zoigl-Weiss, picking up one at the GABF to go along with the one it earned at the OBAs.
- Sunriver can be crowned this year’s fresh hop king, with two wins at the OBAs (see above), and another at the GABF.
- Finally, it might be time to crown Breakside IPA the best IPA in America. It won a gold at the GABF for American IPA twelve years ago, and did it again this year. That makes 7 wins at the GABF and World Beer Cup, five at the GABF. We are not aware of any IPA that has won that many medals.
Congratulations to all the winners!
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Merch!
Oregon beer fans, show your pride! Celebrate Oregon Beer has some new merch, and you can sport one of these beauties now. The proceeds benefit our nonprofit, which means you can look gorgeous and support efforts like this free newsletter. You know Oregon is a special place for beer--now you can let others know, too!
A special shout-out to our collaborators at Double Mountain Brewery, who helped us coordinate with Brewery Branding (hey, that’s a local company, too!) to host our merch on their site. For a small, new nonprofit still trying to fund itself, it was a big help! While you’re there, you could even buy a Celebrate Oregon tee as well.
Support us and let the world know about Oregon beer!
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