Drink for a Good Cause

My friend Katie Burnett just alerted me to a cause I can really get behind:

There are several bars in town rallying together to raise money to help their friends back east whose bars were heavily damaged in the wake of Hurricane Sandy. It was just a few days ago that they were all together in Portland for Portland Cocktail Week, so the bartenders in Portland and Seattle are working tirelessly to raise funds for the United States Bartenders' Guild New York Chapter, which is heading up the charge in that city.

The bars below are donating all the funds from one or more cocktails to the USBGNY this weekend to help the relief efforts:

Portland:
Teardrop Lounge
Park Kitchen
Rum Club
Kask
Central

Seattle:
Rob Roy
Vessel
Liberty Bar

If you can't make it in for a drink, please consider making a donation directly to the USBGNY. Please send checks payable to USBGNY to this address:

Hal Wolin
USBGNY
80 2nd Street
Brooklyn NY 11231

Answer Man

"Cocktail culture" is a phrase that is thrown around with abandon these days. As in which town has one and which one doesn't, whose bartenders have a photo spread in which national magazine and…well, the list goes on.

Here in Portland, as usual, it's a little different. Bartenders are colleagues rather than competitors. They do guest bartending stints "behind the stick" that are the talk of local Twitter feeds. They probably even act as godparents for each other's children.

From October 20th through the 23rd, Portland will be showing the rest of the country how it's done during Portland Cocktail Week. Put on by the Oregon Bartenders Guild and shepherded by the ever-thoughtful Dave Shenaut, it should be quite the shindig, robots, jugglers and all. Read all about it in my article, "5 Questions with Cocktail Week Guru Dave Shenaut," in the October 2011 issue of MIX magazine.

Photo by Taylor Schefstrom for MIX magazine.

Thinking of Eating: Saying Goodbye

"You're cruisin' for a bruisin'," were his exact words. I'd been interviewing Portland bartender Dave Shenaut for an article about Portland Cocktail Week, and he asked what I'd been up to lately. I told him about Roger, the pig I was getting from Clare Carver of Big Table Farm, and that I'd wanted to get to know him, to put a name to the food on my table.

I've had other friends express everything from horror to admiration about the idea, but when I went out to Big Table to say a last goodbye to Roger before he was slaughtered, I knew that Mr. Shenaut had hit the nail on the head.

When I went into the pasture he shares with Don, the other pig Clare is raising, Roger drank some of the water we'd just poured into his bowl. Then, while Don slurped away, Roger came over and stood near me so I could scratch his ears and back. Clare had said that he liked his belly rubbed, so when I reached over his back and started scratching his belly, he slowly sank to his knees and rolled over on his side. He closed his eyes, and his piggy mouth turned up as if he was smiling.

As much as I've dreaded and, in an odd way, looked forward to it, this is Roger's last day. At six o'clock this evening, Richard will drive up to Clare's farm and kill Roger and Don, giving them an instant and humane death. I'll be there, as will another family who are taking half of one of the pigs. It's going to be hard, and tomorrow morning we'll butcher the meat, wrap it up and freeze it for what I'm sure will be some amazing meals.

I'll miss you Roger. You were a good pig.

Read the other posts in this series: Roger and Me, Roger Grows Up, The Day Finally Comes, The Meat of the Matter and Pasture to Plate.