Day 117 – Moving on Up

To the northwest side of town, where mountain views reign supreme. My wife and I bought a house there and will be living there by the end of the month. We prefer that side of Tucson. There's more to do there.

But I'm also moving on up the list on Ratebeer.com as far as the number of ratings go. You have to have at least 100 ratings to make the list. So far 3340 people have achieved that lofty goal. I am 2034 on the list and climbing with 224 ratings. Tomorrow I will fall under the 300 mark of beers remaining to be tasted. That puts me at the 43% mark in only 32% of the time.

I feel like a marathoner hitting his stride.

Allow me to begin the recap of the past week with the worst beer ever made. I mean, THE WORST! It is worse than any IPA I have sampled, worse than skunky Heineken in all its derivatives, even worse than Wild Blue, AB's abysmal attempt in fruit beer.

It is called Cave Creek Chili Beer. Instead of a worm you might find in a bottle of tequila, this one has a chili pepper in it. Cute, huh? I knew this was not going to go well when I discovered that this beer was #25 on the list of Ratebeer's worst beers in the world. Among all the beers I have tried, this was given the lowest rating by ratebeerians. My rating of 0.7 was accompanied by the text below:

"Pours golden with no head, no lacing, carbonation evident. Smells like pickle juice...which is okay, if you're drinking pickle juice. But beer? Tastes like pickle juice, too, with bite. No way I'm drinking this stuff. Is one sip enough to earn the rating? Man, I could have had a chili dog for what I paid for this."

That is correct...one sip is all I took. I poured the rest down the drain. I hope the drain forgives me.

I had some other stinkers, too, but this was by far the worst. The other stinkers were fine brews in a comparative sense.

So let's talk about some brews that I found to be exceptional. Curim Golden Celtic Wheat Beer was a very good imported ale. So was Eye of the Hawk Select Ale from Mendocino Brewing Co. Another great ale was called Sweaty Betty Blonde from Boulder Beer Company (gotta love the name, don't you?). A local amber ale from Prescott (AZ) Brewing Co. called Liquid Amber Ale was excellent. The name wasn't very imaginative, but the ale was fantastic.

Some darker, stronger beers also made the list this past week. Wasatch Polygamy Porter, 8 Ball Stout (Lost Coast Brewery), and Steelhead Extra Stout (Mad River Brewing Co.) were all excellent brews that I highly recommend. Finally, from Mexico, believe it or not, a great brown ale called Cucapa Obscura. Excellente.

Life is good and so is beer!

In honor of Spain winning their first World Cup, "Arriba, abajo, al centro, para adentro." It means "Up, down, center, inside." Supposedly it is a vulgar term, but I guess you have to be Spanish to know why.

Goal...............524.....365
Progress.........224......117
Remaining.....300.....248