This is Chris McGowen. Everyday that you go to work and your computer doesn’t die a horrible death from viruses and botnets (assuming you use McAfee), you should be thanking Chris.

Personally, every time I’m thirsty and am looking for solid alcoholic beverage to chill with on the patio, I thank Chris. Cause by golly, does this guy brew some tasty beer. Not just tasty, but in a true nod to the comfort in his manliness, a fruity beer. Very fruity, and perfect for a warm evening BBQ, or for boozing up your lady for a night of lovin’.

Chris’s entry was a tasty ruby ale that we at the Goodness have name “Ruby McGowen”. The name makes me think of one of those waitresses you’d order pie from in a Texas diner. Sweet, but with a hint of sharpness if you push her. In this case, Ruby had a cool, sharp flavor on first sip, then went down with a mellow fruitiness.

And unlike some fruity beers I’ve had, it had no sugary aftertaste to sicken the palette. (McMenamins!!) All in all a worthy brew that I hope I can con Chris into giving me some more of.

As an aside, I would like to acknowledge my restraint on not making a joke after I wrote the words “went down with a mellow fruitiness”, as well as give a mild taunt to the one called “Jilot”. Mr Packer, along with Chris himself, claimed that Ruby was overly “heady”. Well my friends, take a look at the picture of this pour. I call it skill. Or perhaps a testament to how much I drink…

For a change, before buying this, I actually felt with it and hip. If it hadn’t been for some pressing home matters, I would actually have been at the “release” for this brew. Or at least the tasting. So much was my surprise when I went by the wall of beer and saw a nice big bottle of Stumptown Tart sitting there. I mean look at her, how could you not grab that bottle.

In stark contrast to Walt’s testosterone fueled bottle art, this label not only wouldn’t kick your ass, but would most likely do something entirely different to it. But since this site needs to stay SFW, let’s move on.

The first pour of this told me how good it was going to be. The color alone was inspiring. Ruby-purple. I mean come on. I may be gushing a little too much because I just drank the whole big bottle, but I loved this beer. It takes fruity to the next level.  In all fairness, it’s probably closer to a lambic than an actual “beer”, but its damn good. It’s like drinking an alcoholic carbonated fruit juice.

My only semi-complaint about it, which may seem sort of nit picky, is that the serving size is too big. Because of the size of the bottle, and the desire not to have flat gross day old beer, you feel compelled to drink the whole thing. But man, is that a lot of sweet. I like a good tart as much as the next guy, but there can be too much of a good thing (chaffing?).

Still, super kudos goes to Bridgeport, who currently hold a 6 and a 5 on this site. I’ve been wary in the past since they sell beer at Trader Joes … but hey, everyone is allowed one mistake in life. With this and Haymaker, Bridgeport have climbed the mantle and can now hold on to the coveted “Frosty’s Official Portland Brewery” medal.

In closing, I bid you all to key an eye out for this sweet tart. And when you find her, grab her gently, take her top off, and wrap your mouth around … uh, er … you get the idea.

Before I begin, I would like to point out that written on this label are the words: “Original Bayrisch Gfrorns”. Preach on, shiny nonsensical bottle, preach on.

Trips to the store with Lil’ Frosty have proven fruitful in the past, so as I stood confused at the wall of beer, I once again deferred to the toddler for my ticket to inebriation.

“Get that shiny one!”, I was told. Putting my faith in the hands of someone who eats boogers, I picked up the overly shiny bottle and brought it home.

My first impression was that someone spent a lot of time on this label. Some like, say, Liberace. I do applaud it though. Despite the garishness, there is something appealing about a bottle that takes risks, and isn’t afraid to adorn itself with nonsensical sentences.

Unfortunately, the cliche’ about “overcompensating” proves itself true here again. I honestly didn’t quite know what to make of the beer itself. It was a bit overly fruity, but not too offensive, and thankfully was pretty free of cheek smash. But despite that generic assessment I just gave, the only way I could describe it was that I just didn’t like it. You’d think that something with virtually no hop flavor would be a big hit for me, but alas. It was like the anti-Easy Drinkin’ beer. By the time I was 3/4 of the way through it I had to pour it out.

I found myself having to force it down, drinking it had become a chore. Like that time in college when the beer goggles wore off, but you still weren’t ‘there’…not that I’ve had any experience with that sort of thing…

Yikes! Whooo!!! As I write this, I’m about halfway through a bottle of Samichlaus, and I’m quite loopy — this beer is advertised as officially rated by the Guinness Book of Records as the strongest beer in the world, at 14% alcohol, more even than the malt liquors I’ve been reviewing. This is not a beer for the mild at heart — the flavor more than stands up to the bite from all the alcohol, and needless to say the alcohol itself will cause some complications in your life if you have one, say, on an empty stomach at the start of a business lunch. (”No sir, we didn’t land the Stevens account, because I burped up my spinach omelet into the salad bar…”) It has a licorice taste reminiscent of McEwan’s (or about eight McEwan’s distilled down into a thick slurry) to go along with the kick from the alcohol. All beers over 7 or 8 percent alcohol have a punch-in-the-teeth “Holy Crud!” bite to them, probably from the unexpected combination of beer taste and ethanol. I just dunno if it works, though — ale flavor can’t really stand up well to the alcohol kick as well as other boozy non-beer beverages in the same range, for example cinnamon schnapps (whose taste could overwhelm coal tar).

The label is strangely understated (though the font is so gothic and serif-advanced that I can barely make out the name), much as the champagnes that are superior have the bland labels — they don’t need lots of fuss and business for Jay-Z to know to buy them. Plenty of fuss goes into making this beer, however — it is brewed only once a year on December 6th (St. Nicholas’ birthday — “Samichlaus” translates as Santa Claus), then is left to age for ten months to age before escaping to specialty beer stores. Hardly needs to be said, completely wasted on me. For the average joe like me, this is the beer equivalent of $100 wine that you and 19 of your friends bought together just to see what all the fuss is. And for me, the fuss with Samichlaus turned out to be not much more than getting unexpectedly plowed on a Tuesday night…

So there I was at my local beer pusher the other day, when I was approached by the wiley dealer. “Hey wanna try something awesome?” she said with a crazy enthusiasm. Given my general enjoyment of beer experimentation, I ignored the silly little wine glass it was offered in and tasted what has to be the most unique “beer” I’ve ever had.

Brewed by this crazy little brewery in Japan, this “Commemorative Ale 2008″ tastes like no other beer I know. A hallmark of Japanese beer, it goes down real dry, but then has a bit of fruity aftertaste that I can only really say tastes an awful lot like champagne. And not the bottle cap kind either. Real pop the cork and break a window kind of champagne.

How can I rate a beer I can’t even adequately describe to you as beer … a five? Because despite the ludicrous $4.50/bottle price tag…I actually went back to buy more. Crack dealer 101: the first hit is always free.

**edit - I’m sorry to say that I’ve had to lower my ranking on this beer to a three.   See above for the reasons for this beer’s fall from grace.

The company I work for had a BBQ on site last week. As usual with company bbq functions, they coughed up some beer for us. Yippeee!!! When digging through the bucket o’ goodness, I found some Sam Adams Cherry Wheat. Figuring that it would taste OK, I popped one open and took a swig.

THIS STUFF IS UNBELIEVABLY YUMMY!! It’s not overly fruity but it definitely tastes of cherry. It’s a mild wheat bear that’s incredibly well balanced and not too sweet. These guys know their way around a beer!

With his hairy bare feet and a furry white coat, the Yeti searches for true refreshment while hiking up to the top of his peak. There, sitting in the cold, French alpine stream he finds a cluster of bottles tied together and dangling from a branch. Looking to the left, he sees a couple of men fishing, oblivious of the crime he is about to commit. Grabbing the beer booty, he flings the bottles over his frosty shoulder and continues his journey up the steep mountainside. He only stops one more time to pick up a frozen Jedi before entering his humble cave dwelling. He sets his whining dinner aside and takes a chug from his stolen brewski.
“Oh crepe! This is good stuff!” He finishes the bottle in a couple of swigs.
“Ben.” His dinner responds.
“Shut up you, Ken-ig-got! Before I fart in your general direction!” The yeti slaps his hairy head a few times before returning to his beer.

Unfortunately the Jedi overtakes our French Yetti with a glowing phallic weapon, and the rest is history, (or the future in a galaxy far far away).

Lucky for me, I was able to get my own paws on this good stuff. What first caught my eye was the handsome hairy snow creature smiling at me in the beer isle, but then the yeti on the bottle was pretty cute too. This beer is a blonde with a whole lotta fruit brewed inside. It is a great beer to pair up with a summer meal in the warm evening dusk, or to have with blueberry pancakes in the morning. It is refreshing, and not too light. With 8% alcohol, I was feeling pretty good after one bottle. I recommend it, and be sure to toast the yeti who discovered it as well.

Every now and then, when I’ve had tons of the Easy Drinkin’ brews, I hanker for something more experimental. I wander down to the local brew pusher and grab something off the “wall o’ beer”. Sometimes this can have spew worthy results (see Fuller’s Extra Special Bitter … my dad bought it). But on occasion I get lucky, and this stuff is certainly one of those times. Those crazy Belgian brewers have created a fruity sort of yum in a way that Kona’s Wailua missed entirely. It’s a light tasty Belgian Wheat that leaves no crappo aftertaste that can be the hallmark of foreign beer.

The main problem I have with this beer has nothing to do with the taste, its the goofy wrapper. A snail? Really? I mean maybe they market this beer to France, or perhaps it just has some ingredient that the distributor chose not to mention. Either way, it’s a terrible visual choice, and makes me wonder what exactly it was that brought me to pick it up in the first place. Sacre bleu!

Passion Fruit beer? I mean, I like Passion Fruit. I like Wheat Beer. But put those two things together, and something truly nasty ensues. I can even be accused of liking fruity beers (Go McMenamins Rubinator!), but this is one of those flavor combos that just doesn’t work out. Maybe my real problem was that when I was buying this I was in the mood for Orange Juice. On the bright side, after giving it a few bottles to try and redeem itself (no luck), it turned out that this stuff makes a pretty good chicken marinade. Mix it with some molasses, brown sugar, teriyaki and voila! Something yummy to eat while drinking a better beer.