US: Oregon's new "wine growler law" permits selling wine to go

(OregonLive) - Wine in Oregon. And this may directly affect your Independence Day plans.

Here's the scoop: As of April, any Oregon wine shop, grocery, wine bar or restaurant offering wine on tap (from kegs) may now also sell bulk wine to go, in the same way that you can purchase beer by the growler at brewpubs and taverns. You can even bring your own container, purchasing up to 2 gallons at once. The law also applies to hard cider.

That's where your July Fourth plans come in. Not that I'm recommending it (plastic does not react well with wine), but you could, theoretically, fill a 2-gallon plastic Coleman spigoted jug with fine Oregon wine and serve it to your friends at your barbecue, as you would Gatorade on the sidelines of a soccer game.

Betcha didn't know that, did you? Neither did most of the wine-shop owners I called in the Portland area, including the bartender at Caps & Corks, a bottle shop and pub at Northwest 17th Avenue and Lovejoy Street.

But just a block north of Caps & Corks at The Bent Brick, chef Scott Dolich's tavern at Northwest 17th Avenue and Marshall Street, the wine list is on-tap only, with 16 offerings available by the glass, carafe or half-carafe. So Dolich is giving Oregon's new "wine growler" law a whirl. Patrons can bring in their own growlers, bottles, wineskins or whatever, or, for a $1 deposit, purchase a repurposed wine bottle that Bent Brick staffers have scrubbed clean and fitted with a new screwtop closure.