Raise Your Glass! To the Worst Beer

This week, I offer a toast to the worst beer I have had the misfortune to have tasted. I don’t mean old, skunked out beer. No, I mean a beer that never stood a chance. I won’t reveal its name yet, but I will tell you it sounded like a fast food discount meal and the can was painted in the worst color scheme the 80’s had to offer. I don’t want to describe the taste, for fear of turning away novice beer connoisseurs, but I will say it was a beer that stands out among several decades of drinking as definitely the worst that I have ever, ever encountered.

During the mid-90’s, I took a road trip west with a few friends. We were in college at the time and took the summer to drive across the country and find ourselves. It was a trip right out of your typical road trip movie script, full of misadventures and idiocy. After a first long day of driving, we stopped to get beer at a grocery store in the Midwest. We were proud of ourselves for taking off on an adventure and were college kids, so beer was the one staple of our diet. It took us about 20 minutes to make our selection since we wanted to try something new.

Now, in the mid-90’s the distribution system for beers was nowhere near as well run as it is today and we found an entirely unknown selection of beers in that Midwest grocery store. These beers had names that sounded exciting and we argued over which was of these exciting new types of beers would best set the tone for our adventure. Finally, we made the college student choice and picked the cheapest one - bad mistake.

Nonetheless, we picked up a case of Burger Light beer (yes, the silly name should have tipped us off, but who among us hasn’t made some mistakes in college?) and made our way back to our campsite. Once back at camp, we toasted and proceeded to crack open a few beers in celebration, but found them so terrible that even a few thirsty college frat boys couldn’t finish. Now, back in these days, I had beenAbout to Make a Poor Decision: if we'd only known how terrible those first sips would be... known to pour beer into my cereal for breakfast. I called it the “breakfast of champions,” but it was merely PBR in my Wheaties and it was sadly probably one of my more healthy breakfasts at the time. We also had been known to stock the soda machine in our fraternity house with the cheapest beers we could buy. I say this because it was such a significant feat for us to find a beer so nasty that even we couldn’t finish them. That same half-empty case of beer exploded in the car while riding through the badlands due to the heat, so I also got to smell it for a good part of the ride and I’m sure that has helped my memory remain so vivid. I’m glad to say I haven’t come across any since that summer.

The Badlands: Where even bad beer goes to die The Badlands: Where even bad beer goes to dieNow, one lesson is that you sometimes get what you pay for – the cheapest beer can be usually the cheapest for a reason. However, not every low-priced beer is cheap. I have some favorite lagers that are very available and reasonably priced. The opposite is also true. Just because a beer is expensive doesn’t mean it’s good. I’ve paid dearly for some cheap beers with foul aftertaste, but I’ve also had some high-priced beers that I wouldn’t feed my dog. Price isn’t the way to tell beers apart and the only sure way is to try all you can. I’m willing to risk a bad beer to find a great one. I’ve found a life full of adventure is much more interesting than playing it safe.

But why am I toasting the worst beer in the Beer Connoisseur magazine, of all Near the Beartooth Pass: Isn't this drive worth a great beer? Near the Beartooth Pass: Isn't this drive worth a great beer? places? Well, that beer drunk by a campsite may have been terrible, but it was also the start of something wonderful. We made it to Montana and had an amazing summer of adventures and quite a few delicious beers. I came across my first truly great beer on the top of the Beartooth Pass in a little town named Cooke City – the Redhook Double Black Stout.

The Redhook Double Black Stout was an imperial stout released in 1995 that was infused with Starbucks coffee, dark Redhook Double Black Stout: a great beer worth travelling for Redhook Double Black Stout: a great beer worth travelling for malts and a touch of honey. It only came in 22 oz sizes and we could only get it in the Beartooth Café in Cooke City, which took a treacherous climb over the mountains that divide Montana and Wyoming. Finding that Double Black Stout, which Redhook re-released last fall due to intense consumer demand (and years of hearing me leave tearful pleading messages on random Redhook corporate office answering machines), opened my eyes to the plethora of fine beers available. I finally became a little more discerning with my choices of beers and opted to try some new types of flavors, rather than opting for the cheapest option. My palate that summer was rewarded by other stouts, IPA’s, hefeweisens, summer ales and a new world was opened up to me.