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Every brewery wants you to feel at home. Very few offer an actual living room.
That's one of the many ways Little Beast Brewing's Beer Garden (3412 SE Division St., 503-820-7721, littlebeastbrewing.com) is a welcome respite from a New Portland beer scene overcrowded with garage doors, hazy IPAs and concrete. A retooled bungalow in the heart of Southeast Division's window-shopping district, the quaint yellow abode spent recent years as Lompoc Brewing's Hedge House before buttoning up as the public-facing piece of the Little Beast operation, which brews in Beaverton and will soon move production to the former Drinking Horse Brewing space in Clackamas.
A slim bar with 16 taps and a smattering of indoor seating, the house is warm and cozy for drearier days, but you'll probably spend most of your time in the massive half-covered outdoor area that serves as the liquor-licensed front yard you never had, complete with blankets for picnic-style drinking on the lawn.
Co-founders Charles Porter and Brenda Crow's excellent taste extends beyond aesthetics: Porter is a legendary tamer of funky yeasts who worked at Deschutes and as head brewer at Logsdon Farmhouse Ales before opening this outstanding company—Little Beast's Fera saison made WW's 2018 Beer Guide's top 10 list—and every pour on our two visits was fantastic. From the jammy, raspberry-infused Black Cap to the ambrosial mix of leather and fruit in Golden Stone, a stop at Little Beast means tulip glasses filled with some of the best farmhouse beers in the region.
Crow, the former national sales director of Olympia Provisions, pairs pours with savory fare like a capicola-laden Oregon Grinder sandwich ($12), and some of the silkiest hummus ($9) in town. If our homes were as good as this one, we'd probably never leave.
