Part 6 - Zwickelmania & KLCC Festival in Eugene, OR - High Street
by Bob
High Street Brewery
This McMenamins outpost was the first microbrewery to open in Eugene since the days of Prohibition. The High Street Brewery is located in a renovated house that is more than a century old in a partially residential area, not too far from the University of Oregon. It has two picnic tables out front, and a large front porch which is set up with a couple of tables in the summer. There is also a great deck and patio in the back with more picnic tables.
Our bus, the last run of the day, disembarked and as we entered the building our group was greeted and directed to the rear deck to meet the brewer. He graciously poured a sample of his version of the Collaboration Ale for each of us. This seemed like a very nice dry Cascadian Dark Ale with a hint of extra spiciness. After we finished our samples we followed the brewer into the fairly cramped basement of the house.
Here we encountered a cozy brewery with a brew kettle decorated in a typical McMenamins fashion, and a very idiosyncratic rectangular open mash tun with attached grain mill. Finally we had a peek at the cold room with the bright tanks and kegs, several of which were hooked up to the taps at the bar upstairs.
After the tour, we explored the pub. The main room and a couple smaller rooms on the left are filled with dark wooden tables and chairs. The small bar area is on the right with a few tall chairs in front of the copper-topped bar and a tiny table. The walls and ceilings are beige with a dark green swatch painted at the top of the walls with classic McMenamins odd-ball painted designs (such as various ears in the bar area).
There are ten beers on tap. This is a fairly large selection, but the beers themselves aren't quite in the top league of craft beers. It's still worth visiting, however, as the feeling inside is a lot like being in a house and contributes to the true pub feel.The menus is fairly generic pub, but there are still some inspired choices, such as the excellent tomatillo salsa & chips, and the superb happy hour carnitas tacos we tried. Lovely!
