Hopworks Urban Brewery

HarmonMW

Michigan

4.51/5  rDev +7.1%
vibe: 4 | quality: 4.5 | service: 4.5 | selection: 4.75 | food: 4.5 | $$

Came in late after I had just landed in Portland. Had a pizza that was great. Also tried a flight which was enormous - 10 beers total. Lots of variety in their offerings. My flight contained Abdominable Winter Ale, Cultivator Doppelbock, Deluxe Organic Ale, Don the Younger, Double Dry Hop IPX Mosaic, Hopworks IPA, HUB Lager, Noggin Floggin, Survival 7-grain Stout, and Velvet ESB. Service was excellent as well. Highly recommended.

05-18-2013 23:14:58 | More by HarmonMW

redman683

Oregon

4.45/5  rDev +5.7%
vibe: 4.5 | quality: 4.75 | service: 3.75 | selection: 4.75 | food: 4.5 | $$

Went during Zwiklemania. To be expected, it was very busy. Had a pint of their IPA and a Velvet ESB. Both were great. Food was great also. Because of the organic theme running throughout their menu, there is a wide variety. Also, picked up one of their insulated growlers (full of IPA of course). Portland has a lot of breweries/brew pubs but this is the one I always make sure to go to when I'm there.

02-26-2013 00:00:39 | More by redman683

slander

New York

4/5  rDev -5%
vibe: 4 | quality: 4 | service: 4 | selection: 4 | food: 4 | $$

Now back in and around Portland proper; our absurd travelings about behind us, at last. Ambitious afternoon beyond the OBF, probably not, but I pretty well behaved just the same. So you can imagine my surprise at suddenly finding myself in the parking lot at HUB. I may have been, um, resting my eyes between there and here, hard to say, not seeing things too clearly. Groggy, but I think I’ve got at least one and done in me...

So, up the ramp (a handful of picnic tables there, the patio lined with cut keg planters below triangular awnings), and in. It’s a somewhat rounded hangerish looking building long & narrow with fat angled rafters & ceiling with drop martini glass lampage. Read somewhere that it’s supposed to resemble an upside down boat, and that it kind of do. Cement floors, large panel windows on the front side, and burgundy painted walls otherwise with ‘Portland Timber’ soccer flagging, flats, & pennants.

Through and to a half a hex shaped bar down to the right; stained copper topped, with a honeycomb base, & phat piping phoot rail. Seating for 18 on hightop chairs 3 sides around. The barback does a corner wraparound with a center shelving piece 2 tiered with a TV in the middle of it, and mugs, steins, glasses, trophies, & baby cups. A giant clock sits atop HUB bombers, and there are GABF & World Beer Cup medals. Horizontal boards sit to both sides off the corner listing tap selections, OG, IBU, ABV, & descriptions. Vintage brewerania cans line above, and beer trays atop. Sampler trays and glassware of all sizes & shapes counterside below the boards, and cupboardy space tucked underneath. A row of bike frame uprights runs over the bar with track baby spots within.

On one end, 6 booths along the outside wall, 3 adjacent across the way, and then upwards of a dozen tables running back to an open kitchen, with a kids zone. Toys! I fuckin’ love toys! On the bar side, a dozen and a half booths, hightops, & lowboys running the perimeter along the bar. And there’s some sort of shorty room, maybe 5 x 8, with a single table, chairs, and what Washburn is calling a snake plant. It’s a punishment room if ever I’ve seen one. Staircase front off center to some seating space up above (Never got up there, though. Did I not just mention ‘stairs’?) And a dozen and a half tables on a narrow deck running the length to the rear.

Towers of 10 on each end of the bar, and a pair of handpumps on the corner in between. 10 beers on tap, got to try ½ of them (IPX Cascade single hop, 6.5%, pine, citrus, did not suck; Velvet ESB, tasty, malty, lovely; I am deserving of a large glass of this but it is not tot be; Hopworks IPA, 6.6%, Phil got it, and I moved in on it, a citrus, nice IPA; Evelyn’s Imperial Sunshine, 7.2%, an Impy IPA, grapefruit & piney, not cloying; Ace of Spades, 9.2%, double IPA, big & bitter), and not the other ½ of them (HUB Lager, Survival 7 Grain Stout, Deluxe Organic Ale, Belgian Style Pale Ale, & Kentucky Christmas, which is their abominable Winter Ale bourbon barrel aged), or the cask offering (Deluxe Organic Ale). The IPX Cascade single hop, Velvet ESB, & Hopworks IPA were the best of what I had. You realize of course that of the 10 beers up, 4 of them are IPA’s, right? Yeah, good eye. IPA, IPA, Double IPA, Imperial IPA; Phil was right about breweries having to id beers stylewise for the consumers, we. Brewers just want to make beer, they need to call them something for the likes of us.

We opted for some light foodings; Washburn, the nachofied organic French fries (he ate all of them, not), Phil, the cheese steak, he claimed it was quite good (I saw it, I wanted it, I hated on him), with house made chips of excellent, and I had the wings with some chipotle sauce sold to me as not being so hot. They were nicely smoked and true, there wasn’t too much heat. The serving was only 5 wings (whereas, I would have liked 27), but it showed up over a pile of fries & served with celery.

Nice clean spacious open place. Um, banana bicycle seat ‘head rests’ over the urinals, I don’t know how I feel about that. Good food, and a couple of very nice beers here; would like to get back and take it all in clear & coherently, but that’s another day, another trip.

11-24-2012 17:01:56 | More by slander

MightyCow9

Texas

4.33/5  rDev +2.9%
vibe: 4.5 | quality: 4.5 | service: 4.5 | selection: 4 | food: 4 | $$

This was a truly unique experience for me and my family visiting from Texas. Given our family's desire to eat organic and drink that way too, this bar was an intriguing place to visit. I had high hopes and was not disappointed. It was a very cool family beer bar. I was a bit bummed that they weren't too keen on letting me see the brewery, but that is fine. The food was solid, and the gluten free bread option made me actually interested in eating a pizza. The beers were down the line solid. Nothing was bad a several were very tasty. I very much enjoyed the sampler platter, which contained all of their beers and was 30 ounces of beer for less than that 10 bucks. Their was a small kids corner that my 1.5 yr old and many other kids occupied the entire time at. That was such a simple addition, but it made the experience markedly better. My wife and I would frequent a place like this if it one would ever open in Texas!

11-11-2012 04:38:29 | More by MightyCow9

KDawg

Illinois

3.88/5  rDev -7.8%
vibe: 4 | quality: 4 | service: 3.5 | selection: 4 | food: 4 | $$

Hopworks isn't in the easiest part of SE Portland to get to. It's a bit out of the way, but definitely worth getting to.

Even on a saturday afternoon, there was a good amount of people here and most of the tables were filled. Thankfully my friends had grabbed a table here to begin with.

The HUB brews that I tried were pretty good. Nothing that blew me away, but very drinkable and enjoyable. The service was decent. Sometimes it was hard to find our own waiter, but it usually wasn't too hard to get a hold of a different server to get a beer or food.

The food itself was pretty damn good. I liked the pretzel that my friends got and the ancho lime chicken sandwich that I got was really good.

HUB's location makes it a bit harder to get to than other places in SE Portland. It's definitely on my return list, but not right at the top.

07-03-2012 18:30:12 | More by KDawg

dirtylou

Washington

4.05/5  rDev -3.8%
vibe: 4.5 | quality: 4 | service: 4 | selection: 4 | food: 4 | $$

a bit out of the way as far as Portland is concerned - adjacent to many fast food options along Powell

cool interior - lots of bikes, some tv's, an attractive bar and ample seating.

selection was solid - maybe 10-12 taps with all of the staples and a few draft-only options, including a barrel aged offering that was pretty tasty.

happy hour food menu was solid - "pint O pretzels" delievered and the roasted peanuts could have fed a family of 4

I dig Hopworks - will check out the Bike Bar on my next venture to Portland

04-23-2012 01:19:52 | More by dirtylou

Flightoficarus

Washington

4.35/5  rDev +3.3%
vibe: 4 | quality: 5 | service: 4 | selection: 4 | food: 4.5 | $$

Decided to stop here on a visit to Portland, as I've been pretty thrilled w/all of the HUB beers I've tried beforehand. And how did it fare?

A - Overall atmosphere was pretty relaxed and clean, like a decent restaurant or more upscale sports pub. There's an obvious bike theme going on as well, which overall seemed like a quirky, charming Portland kinda thing that just works for some reason. Also some vintage beer cans and other cool decor to be found.

Q - Quality of everything was fantastic. The beers and the food are all top notch. Unfortunately, there was only so much I could try in one visit.

S - Service was overall good. Was able to sample some beers, the staff was friendly, and everything came out in a timely manner. All while it was fairly busy. No qualms here.

S - Selection is good overall. Saw something in the range of 10-15 house brewed beers on tap. Most of the food menu is your standard fare pub grub (w/unique variations of as well), but also a good pizza selection, and vegetarian/vegan stuff available as well.

F - I don't want to give a 5 just yet w/out trying other things out in the future here, but the food I did have was fantastic, especially for the money. Had an Asian-style battered chicken sandwich w/the cask IPA. Very good stuff indeed.

V - The value of what you get here is top notch. Organic beer and food at a price point that's competitive w/non-organic options (same cost, really) is pretty tough to beat.

Overall, this is a great brewpub, and I will definitely be back whenever I'm in Portland or passing by through I-5. Well worth checking out!

03-31-2012 22:18:03 | More by Flightoficarus

Rifugium

Pennsylvania

3.5/5  rDev -16.9%
vibe: 3 | quality: 3.5 | service: 3.5 | selection: 3.5 | food: 4 | $$

A decent place to visit. Atmosphere was pretty generic / sportsbarish, with an obvious bicycling theme going on. I don't know who's idea it was to combine beer and bike, but to me, those are two things that just don't belong together by any means. "Don't drink and drive," the sign says. Yeah, well, you can still get a DUI for riding a bike drunk, FYI.

Anyway, there was quite an array of house beers to choose from, although really only two or three stood out as particularly good to me, the best clearly being the vintage barrel-aged barleywine. Comfort foods on the menu for the most part, but all good. Service was decent and prices were pretty friendly all over. A nice place, but I'd be fine skipping it on my next visit to the fine city of Portland.

12-30-2011 04:39:21 | More by Rifugium

MsRif

Pennsylvania

4.18/5  rDev -0.7%
vibe: 4 | quality: 4 | service: 4.5 | selection: 4 | food: 4.5 | $$

We went here during our Portland beercation. It was early in the day so it wasn't very crowded, which was nice and definitely contributed to the great atmosphere. We tried everything they had on-tap, and overall, the quality of the beers was really good, but not quite "great." Still worth a visit and a try just for the beers. In my opinion, the place really shined for its food. I love having something organic/healthy to select from, and this place really hit that mark. I had the "Portland Bello" sandwich and side salad which was seriously just excellent. Our server was very friendly and prompt with service, which I appreciated.

I could see myself going here a lot if I were a local. I loved the overall feel of this place and I really enjoyed my lunch and beer samples. Recommended.

12-28-2011 00:22:43 | More by MsRif

colonelforbin

California

4.5/5  rDev +6.9%
vibe: 4.5 | quality: 4.5 | service: 4 | selection: 5 | food: 4.5 | $$

Definitely a great addition to the Portland brewpub scene. This place really is great. Lots and lots of care and attention was put into building and designing the facility. Two levels with ample room for everyone. We sat at one of the tables upstairs and ordered some excellent vegan pizza and great beers. It was great to see multiple vegan options on the menu, though not exactly surprising considering we were in Portland, vegan capitol of the USA (in my humble opinion).

Beer selection was impressive. Wish I had the chance to sit at the bar and get a sample platter but I was pretty happy with the pints I had. The Kentucky Christmas was fantastic and their IPA was top notch as well. I definitely look forward to trying more beers from HUB.

Serive was good, they were very busy (I imagine they often are) and everything went smoothly.

Great space they have going for themselves here, can't say enough about the aesthetics and design of this place. They are big into bicycling and bicycle culture, and this figures into the design and atmosphere as well. I look forward to visiting HUB again and spending some time at the bar.

Definitely put this on your list of places to visit when you are in Portland. Fantastic atmosphere, beer and food.

11-16-2011 06:18:38 | More by colonelforbin