Breakside

By Rebecca Jacobson

5821 SE International Way, Milwaukie, 719-6475, breakside.com. 3-8 pm Monday-Friday, noon-8 pm Saturday-Sunday. 820 NE Dekum St., 719-6475. 3-10 pm Monday-Thursday, 11:30 am-11 pm Friday-Saturday, 11:30 am-10 pm Sunday.

Since opening as a wee Woodlawn pub in 2010, Breakside has moved at breakneck speed. It pops out new brews at a near-ridiculous pace—about 100 different beers annually since 2013, the same year it expanded to a mammoth production space and taproom in Milwaukie—and has racked up a mountain of awards, including a hotly contested gold medal for IPA at the 2014 Great American Beer Festival. Up next is a 5,000-square-foot space adjoining the Slabtown New Seasons, set to open by early summer 2016. We would not expect less from the insatiably ambitious brewer Ben Edmunds, whose thirst for experimentation can lead to an ill-fated porter made with roasted duck, but also to a bier de garde fermented on Turkish apricots, a saison aged in aquavit barrels, and the brilliant La Tormenta, a dry-hopped sour.

Nashco Nashco

Drink This: The venerable Aztec remains one of the best chocolate-chili beers out there, perfectly juggling spicy and sweet.

Willamette Week

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Rebecca Jacobson

Rebecca Jacobson

Rebecca Jacobson is a writer from Portland (OK, she was born in Seattle but has been in Oregon since the day after she turned 10) who's also lived in Berlin, Malawi and Rhode Island. While on staff at Willamette Week, she covered theater, film, bikes, drug dealers-turned-barbers and little-known scraps of local history.

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