Here is the news in Oregon beer for Thursday, the 15th of January. As usual, I’ll be periodically updating this post throughout the day, so check back often. And if you have news to share, please contact me and I can get that updated as well.

McMenamins Kennedy School (Portland) has a limited-edition beer tasting today starting at 5pm, per usual, for Black Days Dark Lager. “Brewed for the long, dark days of winter, Black Days Dark Lager is sure to please all the German lager drinkers out there. Based on the Munich-Dunkel style, our latest lager is crisp and easy drinking with a nice malt flavor and just a touch of roastiness.” At 4.9% abv that sounds pretty easy drinking.

Ground Breaker Brewing (Portland) has the latest in their Experiment Ale releases today, their spring seasonal: Coffee Pale Ale. “To create this beer Ground Breaker started with their award-winning Pale Ale and then added cold-brewed coffee from Equal Exchange rather than the typical dry-hops. Coffee Pale Ale comes in at 30 IBU and 5.5% ABV…. For the release Ground Breaker will be offering a flight that includes three pub only beers. The second beer in the flight is Vanilla Cream Coffee Pale Ale, a small batch of Coffee Pale Ale that has vanilla beans and milk sugar. The final two beers in the flight are brewed with teas from The Jasmine Pearl Tea Company.” That is an interesting theme to fit this release into (coffee and tea), and of course all of them are entirely gluten free.

Agrarian Ales (Eugene) is coming over the mountains to Bend for a tasting at The Growler Guys: “Agrarian is heading to Bend this week, and we can’t wait to share our brews with you! We are excited to have a tap takeover at Growler Guys Eastside on Thursday the 15th from 4:30-6:30. We will have 5 beers available, awesome goodies to give away, and a chance to talk local farmhouse beer with yours truly.” Of course if they are in Bend there’s a good chance for tastings at some of the other places in town like the Platypus Pub. Keep your eyes peeled!

Worthy Brewing (Bend): Their two-year anniversary is coming up on February 4th, and yesterday they brewed a special batch of Go Time Extra Pale Ale to commemorate: “Brewed today: our annual batch of GTX (Go Time Extra Pale), in honor of our 2nd anniversary on February 4. This recipe was the first ever batch from our brew house and we’re bringing it back!”

I’ve always wondered about making a beer with potatoes—in whole or at least in part—but I always figured it would be a homebrewing venture. However Hopworks Urban Brewery (Portland) has done just that: “Fry-PA? India Potato Ale? Today we brewed a collaborative beer, containing Idaho Potatoes, with our pals at Payette Brewing Co. in Boise. We’ll release it soon, so keep your eyes…peeled.” Based on the photos posted, it looks like they used purple potatoes and mashed them up (already boiled?) for the, er, mash. Very curious about this one!

Bridge 99 Brewery (Bend): I’d posted already I believe about the grand opening of their new tasting room, and now there’s an event page with a bit more info: January 22 and 23, from 3 to 7pm each day. Keep that on your calendar and be sure to check it out!

The Green Dragon (Portland): Their weekly meet the brewer event takes place tonight and they are featuring Seven Brides Brewing out of Silverton: “Tonight we welcome Josiah Kelley, Owner & Head Brewer of Seven Brides Brewing! He’ll be coming by to tell us all about the 4 great beers of their’s that we’ll have on tap: Danger Hill, “503” Barleywine, Emily’s Ember, and Kili’s Kolsch… and the 7 daughters he and his brothers will one day have to buy weddings for. Beers get start at 5pm, Josiah starts at 6pm.”

There is apparently a big collaboration brewing going on in Portland this week, featuring all(?) of the breweries that opened in Portland in 2014. From Ex Novo Brewing‘s Facebook status: “Massive collaboration in process! Class of 2014 PDX breweries coming together for deliciousness. @exnovobrew @baerlicbrewing @royale_brewing @stormbreakerbrewing @fatheadspdx (not pictured)” That should be an interesting one to watch out for.