Craft Beer & Winefest gets in the spirits

What started with wine has become highly spirited.

As it rounds the fourth-annual mark this weekend, The Craft Beer & Winefest of Vancouver is just like Vancouver itself: it has lots of growth and diversity to celebrate. What started out as a signature promotion for the local winery scene has become a more inclusive drinker’s paradise: in addition to 100-plus regional wines — many of them grown, made and bottled right here in Clark County — you’ll be able to taste and take home more than 30 craft beers and other lovingly handmade local beverages, such as cider, mead and whiskey. There’ll even be a craft bourbon tasting room featuring spirits from around the state, including Battle Ground’s own Double V Distillery.

That’s what “craft” means to organizers Rusty Hoyle and Sherie Szubski.

“You won’t get mass-produced beer, wine or spirits here,” their website says. “Our wineries are family owned, our breweries are smaller operations who care about their craft, and our craft cocktails are carefully concocted by expert craft mixologists.”

Yes, cocktails too, and one to rule them all: the Bloody Mary.

Who was she?

The origin of the name of that spicy, complex and very red beverage for proven adults is either horrific or hilarious.

One strong possibility is that the Bloody Mary was named for the rebellious first child of the irrepressible Henry VIII — you know, that English king who kept beheading wives until he had another idea: found his own new divorce-friendly church. After he died, exiled daughter Mary I rebelled with what seems like the same savage determination: she led a victorious army against her step-relatives, reinstated Catholicism and had hundreds of leading Protestants burned at the stake. How’s that for history to contemplate while sipping at redness and munching a celery stalk?

The funny option? “Bloody Mary” is a too-drunk-to-talk garbling of “Vladimir,” or Vladimir Smirnoff of the famous vodka family, reportedly an original customer for the vodka-based drink at Harry’s New York Bar, in Paris, in the 1920.

Whichever legend you prefer, Sunday has been designated “Beers, Bloodys and Blues” day at the fest, with locally sourced drinks accompanying some of the area’s grittiest blues musicians. The only interruption will be an important 2:30 p.m. state-of-the-libation address by special guest Judy Bennett.

Bennett is the Portland author of “Bloody Marys: Sanguine Solutions for a Slew of Situations,” a book that’s part recipes and part comedic guide to Bloody Mary culture and best practices. Her Sunday talk is entitled “Seven Ways Your Bloody Mary Can Make You a Hottie.”

Craft tunes, too

Fifteen bands and musicians will rock Esther Short Park throughout the weekend. Headliners include Americana bands The Pearls on Friday night and Lincoln’s Beard on Saturday night; both of these Vancouver outfits fit the festival’s mission of delivering craft, handmade goodness. (Then, for a total change of pace, the Saturday closer will be a unique cover band from Albany, Ore.: TLS Journey, the world’s only Filipino, female-fronted Journey tribute act.) Sunday will be blues and more blues.

New in 2016 will be table seating near winery booths. Returning will be the 1956 Heathen Brewing fire truck, a 1956 GMC that can dispense seven different cold beers. Taps are right on the side of the truck for quick extinguishment of whatever burns within you.

Costs and charity

As festivals go, this seems like a bargain. General admission is $25 for the weekend, including 10 tasting tickets, a souvenir glass and all the music you can absorb. Hang onto your wristband and glass and you’re good to go for three whole days.

Or, dig down deeper for the VIP treatment: $75 per day or $200 for three days gets you a meal voucher, table seating, artisan cheese plate and 20 tasting tickets. For $400 you can reserve your own four-person VIP table (but availability is limited).

A “tasting ticket,” by the way, means a whole glass of wine or a 2 oz. pour of beer; a pint of beer is five tickets. Tickets are $1 each. Other drink prices vary.

There’s plenty of local food for purchase at the fest, too — everything from hot dogs to pizza and soups to Hawaiian-style noodles.

Feel good while you feel great: At least 10 percent of ticket sales will go to the Evergreen School District Foundation. The festival will set up food-donation bins and hopes to hit 10,000 pounds of nonperishable donations for Share, the agency that feeds and shelters the hungry and homeless. Every bag of unexpired, nonperishable food will earn you three tasting tickets.

The event is even dog-friendly. IQ Credit Union will sponsor dog bowls throughout the park. What’s in those bowls?