McMenamins Rock Creek Tavern

Monday 30 May 2016   —   Category: Dining Out

Earlier in the month I enjoyed a won­der­ful couple of hours at the McMenamins Cornelius Pass Roadhouse property, lo­cat­ed on NW Cornelius Pass Road in Hillsboro, Oregon, in the western Port­land metro area. As an extra bonus, I got the first three stamps in my new Mc­Men­a­mins Passport.

Leaving there, I drove north on Cor­ne­li­us Pass Road, then branched off to the left onto Old Cornelius Pass Road, until I arrived at McMenamins’ Rock Creek Tavern, on the eastern edge of Helvetia and only 3.5 miles away from the Road­house. It was time for one more beer, one more Passport stamp, and one more round of photography before the 81-mile drive south to my home in Albany.

I decided to live adventurously and give McMenamins’ Purple Haze a go. Fruit beer isn’t exactly my thing, but I figured it was worth a try. According to the brewer: “As a beer named after the most recognizable of Jimi Hendrix tunes, it’s interesting to note that the song’s colorful imagery came to Jimi in a dream. In a 1969 interview, he said ‘I dream a lot and I put a lot of my dreams down as songs.’ Sixteen years later, McMenamins dared to dream and became the first brewery in the U.S. to legally use fruit in the creation of ales. We still craft our flagship Fruit Ales ex­act­ly as we first did. We aim to make them light, crisp and re­fresh­ing­ly fruity. Purple Haze, a favorite and often requested recipe for over twenty years now, is brewed using locally malted 2-Row and 42 pounds of Oregon boysenberries in every batch.” Meas­ure­ments: 4% ABV • 5 IBU My notes from that day read: “It was OK, a bit watery; what do you expect from such a low-IBU, low-alcohol beer? It was a bit fruity, like it is supposed to be. Don’t know if it would try it again.”

I was pleased to get a fourth stamp in my Passport within a few hours of buying it. On my quest for the Grand Prize, 2 down, only 98 to go!

After finishing my boysenberry beer, I wandered around the building to see if there were any interesting shots. The up­stairs loft was really nice looking, and to­tal­ly empty on a Tuesday in the middle of the afternoon. McMenamins and I both love history. If you do too, don’t miss their four-page PDF about the history of the property — it’s a great read! As typical with most McMenamins lo­cations, there was plenty of custom art­work to admire, including some stained glass works by Portland master David Schlicker. As in the case of this beautiful stained glass pictured to the right, the artwork often illustrates the history of the build­ing, location and/or surrounding area. This pastoral mural depicts Bill Fuegy and the blacksmith shop that he later transformed into the landmark tavern. Read the history mentioned above for all the details.

I didn’t stay long, but it was a tasty treat — for the photography even more than for the beer! I took a total of 21 pictures, and the best 11 now have their own home in the McMenamins Rock Creek 2016 album.

Coming up next ... another tasty McMenamins outing ... and the first rewards from my Passport!