Paydirt

Paydirt describes itself, with no elaboration, as a dedicated drinking establishment. It sits at 2724 NE Pacific Street inside the Zipper, the micro-restaurant building in the Kerns neighbourhood, and it is a sibling to The Old Gold across town — Willamette Week identified it in October 2015 as coming from the owners of Old Gold, including former Portland Mercury music editor Ezra Caraeff, and both bars still publish the same single-barrel programme in the same words, flying longtime staff to Kentucky each year to hand-select bourbon sold only at their own bars. Willamette Week's review captured the setting exactly: the Zipper sits snugly between I-84, Sandy Boulevard, a barbed-wired parking lot and a Pepsi warehouse, and on the outdoor patio there is a fire pit and freeway noise. There is no kitchen — food comes from the Zipper's other tenants — and the bar's booking policy is characteristically blunt, asking guests not to phone but to email instead.

The non-alcoholic list is a full menu section headed "Non-Alcoholic Drinks", and unusually every one of the five is built on a non-alcoholic spirit rather than juice and soda, which puts them at the same complexity as the bar's full-strength list and at broadly the same price. Fool's Gold ($13) is Ritual non-alcoholic whiskey with lime, guava and toasted almond bitters on the rocks. Lone Buck ($12) uses the same Ritual whiskey with pandan, lime and ginger beer, served tall. Moondance ($13) is Ritual non-alcoholic tequila with honeydew, lemon, orange bitters, Tajín and soda. The two Pathfinder drinks are Lane Change ($14), with lemon, strawberry, basil and ginger beer, and Comeback Kid ($14), with lime, passionfruit, agave, orange bitters and soda. There is no non-alcoholic beer on the list, so the zero-proof offering here is entirely a cocktail programme. Paydirt opens at noon on Saturdays and Sundays and at 3pm the rest of the week, running to 1am on Friday and Saturday, with happy hour all day Monday and from 3 to 5pm Tuesday through Friday.