In Portland, there’s good beer everywhere you look. Even the rundown mini-mart on the corner has a cooler filled with craft brew, and the chain grocery stores usually have at least one good 12-pack on special for the weekend. But Portland’s also got plenty of specialized beer and bottle shops where the selection’s impeccable and the staff operates at genius level, so be sure to check out these terrific places to find the perfect gift for the beer lover on your list—even if that beer lover is you.
Belmont Station
Portland’s ultimate beer den has expanded greatly from its days as a hidey-hole next door to the Horse Brass (back in the days when it was actually located on Belmont). Now located on Stark, Belmont Station is a veritable compound of all things beer, with their 34-tap Biercafé adjoining a selection of more than 1,400 different kinds of bottles and cans, and more coming in each week. This is the place to score the newest, freshest, rarest thing to drink, but be sure to stop in often, because limited releases can disappear off shelves in a matter of days. There are also tons of tastings, tappings, and special events on their calendar, and they even collaborate with breweries for special Belmont Station beers you won’t find anywhere else. (4500 SE Stark, belmont-station.com)
John’s Marketplace
An old grocery store that’s been stuffed to the gills with beer, John’s Marketplace has one of the city’s biggest selections; wandering through its shelves is like getting lost in a musty, stack-filled bookstore, except with beer. They’ve got a great selection of kegs for sale, too, plus a huge amount of wine (if your household swings both ways), and there’s a deli counter where you can score super-cheap burgers. Keep your eyes peeled for John’s to open their second location sometime in 2020, located on Southeast Powell in the former home of the Original Taco House. (3535 SW Multnomah Blvd, johnsmarketplace.com)
The BeerMongers
Drink your beer here or take it to go: The BeerMongers, in addition to having lots of coolers jam-packed with bottled and canned beer, has a 10-tap bar and a cozy rec-room feel, with TVs, board games, and plenty of beer obsessives to chat with over a pint of something uncommon and good. Located in inner Southeast Portland’s beer nexus, it’s a stone’s throw away from Apex Beer Bar, Grixsen Brewing, Baerlic Brewing, Vagabond Brewing, and lots more, so it can either be part of an epic beer crawl or you can make it a destination in its own right. (1125 SE Division, thebeermongers.com)