I present his here to you as a cautionary tale.

Grandpa Goodness was in town, and we shared some of the yummy Hitachino Nest, both coming away with what we thought was a new appreciation for Japanese beer. Sadly, one day while I was away at the salt mines, Grandpa, flush from the success of the previous evening, decided to go to the local beer pusher and pick up something new from Japan to try.

And so begets what is about the worst beer I’ve tried in the 60+ reviews on this site. It’s been a long time since I’ve had those college mainstays Keystone and Natural Light, but if my memory for nausea serves me right, they have a Japanese equivalent. Light like urine, rancid tang like urine (wait, how would I know that?) this stuff was … less than stellar.

There are quite a few things I like to recall from college, but what the frat party beer tasted like isn’t one of them.

I can now add another in my quest to review all the brews from this generation’s best brewery, New Belgium. This time I had a six pack of something that can only be described as Happiness in a glass. It was like drinking sunshine. Sunshine Wheat to be exact. And very appropriately named. It was light, refreshing, a hint of fruitiness, and if such a thing can be said … it tasted … cold. If you like wheat beers that are light enough to please the pilsner crowd, start guzzling now. As the three recent empties in the picture can attest to, you’ll drink them fast. Too fast, the throbbing in my head might say…

You know how when you taste a particular nasty flavor, it just sort of sticks with you? You may have only had it once, but you instantly recognize it when you taste it again. I can say the same about beers like Coors and Budweiser. Brewed heavily with rice, they have this kind of “crappy beer” twangy aftertaste that screams wifebeaters and mullets.

Unfortunately, the same can be said for Red Hook’s SunRye. The packaging is top notch (cool bottle shape even), and the promise of a yummy summer beer is inviting. But once you have that first light sip… I’d swear this was a Coors in a fancy wrapper. I wanted to like it, I really did, but damn that aftertaste.

It almost meets the criteria for a 3, but my total disappointment, and the fact I don’t want to drink the 4 remaining bottles in my fridge smack it down to a sad 2. If they could kill the post sip twang, this would be some good stuff. But until then, I don’t want to feel like I’m back in high school, drinking Bud or Natural Light in my buddy’s garage while his parents are out of town. Blech.

After the 2nd 90+ degree day in a row, I decided to bite the bullet and install the AC unit. Once I lugged the thing in to the house and spent a few blistering minutes out on the back porch putting it in the window, I am now enjoying a couple of degrees less heat and a bottle of New Belgium’s Skinny Dip Ale.

I need to come clean about something first, when I went to the store I intended to pick up a case of my old favorite, Miller Highlife. However, when I got there I wasn’t in the mood for the Highlife. There was also someone else there and I was ashamed. But as I drink my Skinny Dip, I am glad my shame led me to by it. Light, but with that Fat Tire full-bodied taste, and a burnt-chocolate finish. Very yummy and light too! So I won’t gain any weight, right?

If you’re looking for a light beer that REALLY tastes great, Skinny Dip is it. Prost!

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!

Turns out I am a complete suckah-fish for good packaging. Case in point: Full Sail’s Limited Brew. Full Sail’s packaging is top-notch. Each brew is visually distinctive but shares a common brand. The magic happens when you look closer. Witty banter is sprinkled about the packaging in the voice of a stoner outdoorsy type with long hair, tie-dye, and the faint sent of petchuli. He says the word “dude” A LOT. But he loves brewin’ good beer so its cool. He’s “livin’ the dream.”

Light-bodied with a somewhat burnt-chocolate finish seems like an oxymoron, but I swear its there. The “Dude” says it is an import-style lager but I’m not buying it. I guess if you’re talking about some lambic, or tripel, this might qualify as a distant cousin but its definitely not your typical “euro-bud” trash (Becks, Heineken, etc).

So, long story short: I dig it… um, dude. I think I’m going to set out to see if good packaging equals good beer. Sounds like a good combo of my two favorite things: good beer and good design. In the end, we’ll see which one deserves the top spot.

Any beer from Bridgeport Brewery will always get my attention. This local brewery’s IPA will always have a special place in my fridge. However, when I look at the beer cooler at my local Freddies I have to wonder if it isn’t just a big beauty contest.

The packaging on beer labels and boxes gets more and more elaborate each year. From the local artistry featured on Rogue Ales to the slick Budweiser Select bottles, a lot of thought goes in to the look and feel of your average brew. And there is definitely a “micro-brew look.” If you look closely, you can tell the posers from the real thing.

Bridgeport’s Haymaker Extra Pale Ale is no exception when it comes to the design of the packaging. As a designer, I appreciate the level of branding and illustration. This beer is definitely the product of a highly skilled marketing team. However, it IS the real thing.

The verdict: Bridgeport brings their characteristic hoppiness to a wheat beer. Finishes light and crisp, just right for summer time.

Ok, so this stuff is the Pee-Colored KoolAid, Fat-Chick of beers. You don’t want to tell your friends that you still take advantage of either, but you do anyway and keep it to yourself.

While Corona might be complete crap to a true beer aficionado, I can’t claim to be one, so I’m tossing it in the ring here. This stuff is just too easy to drink to pass up. It’s a good fallback beer when you don’t want to invest in anything heavier, but the thought of a beer still sounds good. It’s appeal rises as the temperature does.

I, unlike many others, don’t care to add lime to mine. That just seems more wrong than simply drinking this stuff does.

Anything this mindless and easy to drink deserves a solid 3.  Make no apologies for drinking what you like.

Alaskan Brewing just brews cool stuff. One of my favorite types of lighter ales, Kolsch is always easy to drink and this copy of it works well. This stuff, according to Alaskan’s website , is based upon a Kolsch style.

OK, enough beer geek talk. This stuff ain’t too hoppy or heavy and is just nice to drink when the weather warms up. I buy this stuff in 24 packs at Costco and it doesn’t last too long. The wife doesn’t like it, but that isn’t always a bad thing. It just means more for me.

I’d rate it higher than a 4, but I’m still testing out the rating’s scale here. When I can find it, and room for it in the beer fridge, it’s an easy pick at the store.

-Cheers

So why three bottles in the picture for this review? Because that’s how many the missus and I went through before I realized we were getting drunk and hadn’t done a review yet. In a word: “Yum”. Super Yum even. I give it a 5 because when I got home after losing our basketball game, I downed two. And when I came home after winning the next one, I downed two again.

Pity not my liver, for the six pack has run out. But if you see this stuff in the store pick some up. Both Arty Rex and I agree that it’s the official summer beer of 2007. Awesome for “being manly at the grill”, drowning sorrows (& celebrating victories), and despite what Arty says, it goes great with grilled asparagus.