Man rehydrates 30-year-old bottle of Portland Punch for taste of Oregon nostalgia

PORTLAND, Ore. (KOIN) — An extinct piece of Portland history was recently brought back to life when a former Portlander discovered a 30-year-old bottle of fruit punch in his brother’s garage, rehydrated it and took a drink.

Portland Punch, a concentrated fruit drink made from raspberries and loganberries, filled punch bowls at Oregon parties for decades. The drink was created in 1943 by Portland’s “soda pop king” Louis Albert — a Jewish immigrant who emigrated to the United States from Kyiv as a teenager in 1906.

Landing in New York on the day of the Great San Francisco Earthquake, Albert moved to Portland in 1911 with $6.75 in his pocket, he recalled during an interview recorded in 1973 for the Oregon Jewish Oral History and Archives project. After purchasing a horse and wagon, he went into the laundry business. From there, Albert built a small empire that later evolved into the Royal Flush Beverages soda company. He earned the title of Portland’s soda pop king making drinks like Ace High, a lemon-lime soda, and Morning Dew, which tasted like pancakes and syrup. Of all his beverages, Portland Punch had the longest lasting success.

“I was the only one in Portland that had fruit drinks,” Albert said. “I believed in giving the people fruit drink.”

Portland Punch was a major success, Albert’s granddaughter Judy Blauer recalled during a similarly recorded interview in 2005.

“[Portland Punch] became very, very well known,” Blauer said. “... It was a very popular drink.”

The Holden family of Southwest Portland was among the local residents who made Portland Punch a family tradition. Michael Holden, 57, has fond memories of drinking Portland Punch with his grandmother “Tutti” at her home near Washington Park in the 1970s.

Those childhood memories flooded back to Holden when he rediscovered one of grandma Tutti’s old bottles of Portland Punch in his brother’s garage on a sunny December day in Los Angeles.

“One of her favorite drinks, and consequently, one of our favorite drinks, was Portland punch,” Holden shared on the Portland Reddit page on Dec. 17. “My uncle and I moved her out of her apartment in the early '90s. There was a bottle of Portland Punch in her refrigerator, and I kept it as a memento. It has been moved around from Portland to Seattle to Los Angeles over the decades, and as I prepare to move back up to Seattle, [it was] rediscovered today in a box.”

Although the drink was once a local household name, Portland Punch slowly became less popular over the course of 70 years and seemingly disappeared from shelves a decade ago.

“My understanding is the Portland punch is not made anymore,” Holden said. “I used to be able to find it at the Fred Meyer's in Klamath Falls, usually on the way to Burning Man, and I would buy every single bottle of it that they had and then keep it and hoard it to dispense, miserly, for special occasions, but that hasn't been for more than 15 years at this point.”

Knowing that he may be holding the last bottle of Portland Punch in existence, Holden decided to enjoy one last drink and document his findings on the Portland Reddit page.

“My understanding is that this is at least 65% sugar,” he wrote. “As I understand it, bacteria cannot grow under such conditions. There's no mold or weirdness in the bottle, it doesn't smell funny, it's been kept in cool dark places. It seems as if all of the water has evaporated out of this bottle, leaving a thick, syrupy liquid that pours slower than molasses.”

Suspecting that the dehydrated syrup was still palatable, Holden heated up some water and rehydrated the decades-old Portland Punch. While the exact age of the bottle is unknown, the bottle’s original label lacks nutritional information, indicating that it predates 1994, when U.S. food labeling laws went into effect.

“I am drinking the last Portland Punch on Earth,” Holden wrote. “Of course, if anyone knows where to get more, for Christ sakes let me know now before I risk my life or at least my intestinal stability for one last taste of this delicious nectar.”

Despite finding some strange residue at the bottom of his glass, the punch tasted exactly as he remembered: “Delicious,” he told KOIN.

“If this was a French wine it would be so expensive,” he shared on Reddit. “On the whole, 10/10 A+++++, would drink again.”

After the experience, Holden had a moment of reflection about life and the memory of his grandmother, Gertrude “Tutti” Julie Holden. Years after her passing, Holden’s grandchildren are still sentimental about her last bottle of Portland Punch and a strange pack of mints that she kept in her fridge for decades.

“In this case, my grandmother Tutti, who survived the holocaust, World War 2, all these things are reduced to green mints and a bottle of Portland Punch,” he said. “It makes you wonder how you'll be remembered by your grandchildren a century from now.”

Until Holden’s Reddit post, Portland Punch was also a distant memory. The piece of Portland history was discontinued in 2014. Before that, the drink changed hands a number of times. At the end of Albert’s life, Portland Punch was sold to Stidds, a local company that manufactured tamales and other goods for local businesses. Portland woman Darlene Brunson, who died at the age of 99 in 2023, mixed Portland Punch for Stidd’s until the day the business closed in 1984. After Stidds closed, Portland Punch continued, and was ultimately sold to Trailblazer Fruit Products, Inc., which continued to sell the drink at Fred Myer stores until it was discontinued in 2014 due to “declining demand,” Trailblazer Fruit Products, Inc. CEO Jamie Brandenburg told KOIN.

“We stopped selling it roughly 10 years ago,” Brandenburg said. “Consumer demand was declining.”

Although Portland Punch no longer exists, Brandenburg said that the company would consider bringing the product back if there was enough demand, or if someone was willing to work with the company to produce a limited run of the drink.

“Certainly. We’re always willing to have the conversation,” Brandenburg said. “We made it here before and it could be something we’re open to exploring for sure.”

Anyone interested in bringing back Portland Punch can contact the company through its website: TrailBlazerFoods.com. And as long as the drink is discontinued, Holden is offering to drink any bottles of Portland Punch that might still exist.

“My message, if I have any message at all,” he said. “Is that if you have any Portland punch sitting around and you think, "Oh my God, it's been sitting there for 15 years, it's got to be poisonous, no way am I ever going to drink this.” … Well [send me a personal message on Reddit] and I'll send you my address and I'll pay for postage so you can send it to me, and it can be disposed of properly.”