Bad Beer Party

The long awaited bad beer party was a hit. Members of the Amalgamated Brewers' Guild brought their worst to my house, invited a few others, and got fairly well trashed. We kept a comment sheet to record the occasion.

Andrew brought his overly banana-y Belgians, which were nowhere near bad enough to contend for the prize of "Worst Beer." Randy brought a so-so pilsner, a so-so steam, his bizarre lactose-enriched Belgian ( a long story...), and his best entry, a sour schwarzbier. Brad brought a weird IPA that has had problems. There was a point where it smelled just ungodly, but it may be getting better. Except the one he somehow put in a twist-off bottle that was getting ready to go to vinegar--ugh. Buck brought "Nothin' under the kilt" Scottish ale, a profoundly lifeless, uninspired title-contender. One taster noted "Watch out Dasani!" Another noted a profoundly repellant Cepacol aroma. It really blew.

I had the most entries, as I was the host and had a year's worth of mis-fires close at hand. My Kolsch was described as having a "hint of Irish Spring" as well as being disagreeably sour. My OBB Oatmeal Stout was a psychotic geyser, prompting the note "Holy Volcano Batman!" A jeroboam I've been trying desperately to open and empty contained my over-spiced Belgian. Randy, I think, wrote "hideous aroma, as always." Buck and I shared the final bottle of my way off-style VMO, which has a bizarrely excessive aroma of mulling spices--it almost comes off like a pumpkin ale. No idea what happened to that one. Worse still, I used the yeast cake for my Doppelbock, one of the great disappointments of my brewing career. It garnered the following reviews: "What IS that smell? An abomination. Great with an old boot. Medicinal aroma; solventy malty flavor." My Oatmeal Ale also won few fans. Randy hated it most. I think he wrote down all of the following: "No smell, sour apple cider! Yuck! Awful. Absolutely horrible; a wall-scaler; clarity, head, aroma, flavor."

The best beer of the night may have been my accidental sour brown. This was a beer that was intended to be a Rochefort 6 clone. It was horribly sabotaged by the use of this bad sack of unevely kilned Franco-Belges Pilsner malt. It wouldn't attenuate properly and had some weird flavors, so I wound up heating it, and shaking it, and testing it like 5 times. Lo and behold, it got infected. Everyone agreed, however, that it has a nice sourness that almost seems intentional: "If I have to drink a shitty beer, this is the one!" I'm hanging onto a sizable stock of that one and will see how it develops; it really feels not entirely unlike an oud bruin. Finally, the beer formerly known as Fawcett's Amber, currently known as "Ass-Juice Amber" received the following remarks: "Great aroma, a little bitter and sharp. Aptly named! Mmm, candied prunes. Ugh-blech." This would've been poured out a week ago if I had had a beer ready to go in the keg, but I was glad I saved it for the event.

Buck and I were the last two there who were committed to picking a winner. We probably should've set up a ballot box. Anyway, we used what was left of our palates to decide that a co-winner was in order. Despite Randy's hatred of Oatmeal Ale and his strange appreciation for Ass-Juice, we gave the title to Ass-Juice and "Nothin' under the kilt." It was just too close to call. Thanks for comin' everybody!