Old Town Pizza

By Kat Merck

5201 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., 200-5988, oldtownpizza.com. 11:30 am-10 pm Sunday-Wednesday, 11:30 am-11 pm Thursday-Saturday.

With open timbers, heavy furniture and a pot-belly stove glowing away in a corner, this space is vaguely reminiscent of a 17th-century warship. So don't be too surprised if you, like us, saw a group of grown men dressed as pirates ordering a round of dark ales. Aside from the pizza being served and a row of steel tanks visible behind a glass partition, there was little indication of this being the brewery outpost of a long-beloved, reputedly haunted pizzeria above the Shanghai Tunnels in Old Town. In business since 2011, Old Town Pizza's brewery specializes in small-batch classics, including a Kölsch, a red, and a handful of traditional IPAs, along with a selection of rotating and seasonal brews, which this fall included a decent barleywine and pumpkin ale. Old Town may not be the most innovative option in the neighborhood, but it's got pizza and delivers beer to nearby homes by cargo bike—if that's not good enough, you're better off walking the plank.

Drink This: The flagship Shanghai'd IPA, also available in bottles, has a slightly sweet and not overly bitter finish.

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Kat Merck

Kat Merck

Kat Merck was a Willamette Week copy editor and copy-desk chief from 2006 to 2012. She is now a Portland-based freelance writer and editor specializing in food, beer and parenting.

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