Monday 27th June 2011

Bob Thompson

I was hoping for a lie-in this morning but it was awoken about 08.00 by the hotel's fire alarm. After the Fire Department had left, it was too late to sleep further so I went in search of breakfast.

I had planned to partake of my first beer (or should I say bier) at a slightly unusual brewpub. Gordon Biersch is a chain of pubs that only brew German and Czech styles. There are branches across the USA including Hawaii. There's even one in Taiwan!

The Seattle pub is located on the top floor of a prestigious Pacific Place Shopping Centre. The address is 600 Pine Street, Suite 401. It's next to an 11 screen AMC cinema complex, see photo above. The brewery is to found behind the bar. It supplies draught beer to the pub. Bottled beer comes from their large brewery in San Jose, CA.

I ordered a sampler tray. It had six beers which including five regulars plus the summer seasonal. They were Golden Export (5.0%) (a light lager), Hefeweizen (5.5%) (Bavarian wheat beer), Czech Pilsner (5.6%) (Bohemian style lager), Märzen (strong medium-brown Bavarian style lager that was originally brewed in March to be consumed at harvest time) (5.7%), Schwarzbier (black beer from Southern Germany) (4.7%) and finally a seasonal, Sommerbrau (a Kölsch type beer) (4.8%).

They all seemed a bit thin compared with their true life originals. Some of these styles are types I wouldn't drink in Germany if I had an alternative. Nevertheless the best, I thought, was Czech Pilsner. It wasn't much like I thought it might be, but it certainly had the right amount of bitterness. As it began to fill up with business persons searching for lunch, I thought it time to visit another brewpub.

Important Information:

Gordon Biersch, 600 Pine Street, Suite 401, Seattle WA. 98101. Tel: 206 405 4205

Open: Mon to Thurs 11.00-23.00; Fri 11.00-24.00; Sat 09.00-24.00; Sun 09.00-23.00

To be found on the fourth floor of the Pacific Place Shopping Plaza, thisbrew pub is situated downtown three short blocks from Westlake station which is served by almost every conceivable form of ground transport; conventional buses, battery buses, electric trolley buses, a streetcar line, rapid transit train and even a monorail!