Yes, we did call Portland "overrated" and "dull" and we got some reactions because of that. @ErrikaEats (from blog of the same name), for example, said, "@SpoCool Gets it all wrong about #Portland!" and "PDX is the Foodie capital of the world!What's not exciting about that?"

We did, of course, mention the town's good dining options, and we'd probably agree that it could be called the food capital of the Northwest. But of the world or even the US? That's up to the individual to decide, certainly, but it's not how we see it. And so we asked on Twitter, "In your opinion what is the Food Capital of the USA? World?"

We received many good responses. Some of our favorites:

@chefdavidblaine: "NYC is the US capitol but PDX has the spotlight. World=Paris." A good reminder that trendy isn't always "best", even though being in the spotlight is well and good. NYC and Paris are probably the two answers closest to being "correct" historically, if we were only to accept two answers.

@chaoticwine: "Vegas for USA. Its got nothing original, but brings in everything from everywhere. Provence for world, food and lifestyle collide" Any American chef with a name seems to have opened a spot in Vegas, so there's an argument to be made there.

@spokanemac: "San Francisco, hands down. We've got it good here in Spokane, but nothing holds a candle to variety and quality."

And so on and so forth: Chicago, Montreal, etc. Many good suggestions, and we can say with some certainty that all aforementioned cities are great food destinations.

We do, shockingly enough, have our own thoughts on the matter. Subjectively we have many favorite cities, from Tangier, Morocco to Murcia, Spain.

Yet there are many larger areas of the world where food-culture runs deeper than others—many Mediterranean countries for example—and therefore defining a de facto "capital" can be difficult. Is it possible to pinpoint one Italian city as the food capital, when it could be argued the whole country is in the game, with large differences between northern and southern cooking?

In that sense, when one takes a step back, defining one food capital of the world is nigh impossible, even though finding that one capital will be a talking point for many. And why not? It's a discussion that can take us to many good cities we all should visit.

That brings us to this conclusion: Calling any city a food capital is entirely subjective, be your opinion Portland or Paris. Don't buy into the hype of what's trendy; don't be told what you're supposed to like. Find your own favorite food capital or food region or food country through travel. There's more to life than what's in your backyard.

In the words of Lonely Planet: "Do something good for your country. Leave."

So here we have Deschutes' version of Collaborator No 2, and while it's obviously the other side of the same coin, it's just a little bit different and a little bit better than Boulevard's version.

It pours similarly to the Collaborator, but has a more yellow hue to it, though it's still hazy looking. The head is thick, white and inviting. A quick sniff reveals a spicy profile, but here there seems to be more hops up front. 

Sip it, and you have something very similar to the Collaborator, but the flavors just seem a bit more balanced here. The spices kind of attack the tongue in tandem with the spices and citrus. This is the Collaborator, yet it isn't. It might be a bit less subtle with more of a kick up front, courtesy of the hops.

Cross-comparing bottles is probably a pretty interesting experiment (we only tried them from tap) particularly after a couple of months of aging. They're both excellent ales, certainly, but personally I'd go for the Conflux as the "winner".