A smallish offering this Sunday evening.
A sample, if you will.
We are at Cascade Barrel House, a brewpub whose claim to fame is that they make sour beer.
Mark’s idea.
I have no idea what a “sour beer” might entail, but it sounds horrible, so I scan the beer menu for an IPA.
There is a single IPA. I order a pint of that.
Mark reads through the list of sour beer offerings and asks the waitress if she has any recommendations. She recommends two beers, and he asks for a sample of each. As she writes this information down, he explains, “So I’ll just taste those samples, and then I’ll decide what beer I want to order.”
Snort!
I lean across the table, “So what you’re saying is that you are going to sample the samples, and then actually maybe order a beer? I bet she is way delighted to have you lay out your course of action like that.”
Mark doesn’t look up from the beer menu, “Hush.”
I lean back, “Yes sir. This way? No surprises. No . . . Oh my god, what is that man doing? Ack! IS HE SAMPLING THE SAMPLES? Do you think he might order a regular-sized beer?”
Mark settles into his seat, “You’re an ass sometimes.”
We chat about nothing in particular for a few moments, and then our beers arrive.
My IPA is nothing special. Drinkable, but boring. Too much rye for me.
I like hops.
Mark’s two samples are fruity jewel-toned.
Beer should not be fruity jewel-toned, people.
Mark asks me if I want to taste them, and I hesitantly pick up the one that looks more like actual beer . . .
A cloudy yellow-orange liquid.
I take a sip and literally gag.
How to describe?
OK, let’s suppose that a glass of wine is spilled and the bartender heads over to wipe up the mess with a rag. He then uses that same rag to sop up a small bourbon spill in another part of the bar. He inadvertently leaves the rag on the bar overnight and it grows rank with the passage of time. The next day, it smells so bad that the bartender dumps a bottle of lemon juice over the rag, hoping to cut the stench.
He gingerly picks up the rag to transport it to the laundry, but on his way?
He suddenly has a break with reality and curls up on the floor in the fetal position, sucking on the rag for comfort.
Yes . . . that’s what it tastes like.
I gag some more and laugh, “Oh, babe. That is horrific.”
I reach for his second sample, which is a dark purple-toned beer.
I take the tiniest of sips.
It tastes like vomit.
I am not even kidding.
Mark is tentatively sipping now, “OK, I taste blueberries . . . but like a big pile of blueberries that have fallen to the ground and been left to ferment and rot in the sun. It’s not that bad.”
Snort!
I am gulping down my own beer, which suddenly tastes spectacular in comparison, “It only tastes like rancid blueberries if you imagine that you have eaten a pile of those rancid blueberries and then vomited from the horror of what you have eaten.”
Mark is stubborn and keeps sipping at his two samples, but I know he hates them, because with every teeny sip he takes, his whole face recoils in an involuntary expression of disgust.
I continue, “Yes, as if you ate and then vomited up rancid blueberries and then thought to yourself . . . That was fucking awesome! I so want to taste that again! And then you re-drank your own rancid blueberry vomit.”
Mark tries to divert attention from the fact that he is not drinking his samples by holding first the purple one and then the orange one up to the light, “Look how the light shines through the beer!”
I take a drink of my beer, “Know what else would look all gorgeous in the light? A sample of my urine. Yup, it would be beautiful, but guess what?”
Mark sets the samples down and looks at me, “What?”
“Not going to be drinking a urine sample, no matter how prettily it might catch the light.”
The waitress comes back.
Mark thinks maybe he has had enough of sour beer, and he will have the IPA.
Snort!
So we sit there and drink our non-sour beers.
Everyone around us seems to be quite pleased with their sour drinks, by the way.
And then I hear a man say this . . .
“There is just nothing like a toasty-hot sour cherry beer with a slice of orange.”
People?
He was right.
There is nothing like a toasty-hot sour cherry beer with a slice of orange.
NOR SHOULD THERE BE.
Ack.
Ack.
I never thought I would say this again. Ever.
But gimme a Coors.
Ack. But at least no blueberry pukeskis…
Oh, Bill.
It was horrific.
I am not a Coors fan, but I would drink nothing but Coors forever to avoid another sip of the beers at this place.
It was that bad.
Ew.
Yuck.
There clearly should not ever be any of these sour beers. blech. Who came up with such a revolting idea in the first place?
Oh my god.
You should have seen the happy people in this place going on and on about wine-barrel aging and bourbon-barrel aging and fruit fermentation and weird yeast and bacteria.
The age of hoppiness is ending, according to these sour folks.
Ack!
Don’t they know that if something has weird yeast and bacteria, you don’t drink it. You might douche it…but you definitely don’t drink it!! Gross!
Clearly these people have been drugged, or hypnotized. You probably got out of there just in time.
Right next to us?
Two men ordered samples of every beer available.
All I could think of was that we needed to get out of there before they started barfing.
And then drinking their own barf.
Seriously.
ACK!
What?!?! Sour beer! Just when I thought I had heard everything, you tell me there is sour beer. Shudders! However, I’m laughing out loud at Mark’s misfortune!
Poor Mark.
He is so stubborn.
Poor stubborn sassy Mark.
And Vlad the Imp Aler? Ack again.
I thought I had a shot at winning a recent advertising contest to name a new German beer.
“Sig Heil Have Another” was my offering.
Didn’t win. Go figger.
Maybe I shouldn’t have mentioned the war…
I know, I know!
Oh, and your beer name?
I am giggling hysterically.
Oh my god.
okay.
so i totally read the tag as “vlad the limp aler”
got pretty giggly.
snort.
Oh . . . my . . . god.
That should SO be the name of their beer.
That’s awesome.
Not a fan of beer, but anything that says it’s sour is usually not good.. Especially when it’s not typically sour in the first place.
Gag!
Natalie -
The customers in this brewpub, though?
You should have seen them.
They were so happy.
Hee hee!
Kris,
I forgot to ask.
And I do so with some trepidation.
Amidst the wine-barrel aging and bourbon-barrel aging and fruit fermentation and weird yeast and bacteria – was there dipping involved?
By a stunt Johnson?
Bill
Bill -
Here in the secrecy of my comments I will share with you that the woman whose husband agreed to provide the stunt penis had a little problem with the research.
And that problem would go by the name of “extreme shrinkage.”
Because she chilled the champagne to an icy coldness before the dipping began.
Ummm . . . that was not ideal.
As it turns out.
Snort!
More research is planned.
But there has been a delay here.
Ahem.
Another day or two, and I will be ready to instruct someone (who shall remain nameless because he is married to me and does not yet know he will be dipping in the name of scientific research).
Ahem again.
Heeeeeeyyyy!
The shrinkage was not ‘extreme.’
And recovery was full and swift!
(I feel a need to defend my husband and his guinea penis pig. Which is more than perfectly fine thankyouverymuch)
Rebecca -
I asked Mark what sort of shrinkage there would be in such a situation, and his guess?
Was “extreme.”
And I so did not mean to imply that there was not an immediate and full recovery!
My apologies to the guinea penis pig.
Seriously.
Hee hee!
Yes, well, Mark would be incorrect in his guessing.
And I made up for my mischievous chilling of the bubbly.
Anything but shrinkage.
Anything. But.
(Disclaimer: No cheese wheels were harmed in the recompensation for aforementioned dippage in chilled bubbly)
Okay beer? Yeah not my fav. When necessary I will drink a dark beer.
What’s really bad? I should know more about this making of beers since it is kind of related to my job. I probably have instructions somewhere. But really? I don’t care that much.
Give me a winery any day. They smell better too. Except for about a month in the fall.
Lizzie -
I like IPAs.
I enjoy most beers, but my preference is IPAs.
Wine = headache.
Every time.
And what is your job?
Oh and if you stick to white wine you shouldn’t get a headache. The tannins in the grape skins usually cause the headaches. They remove the skins for white wines before fermenting.
Nope.
Still get a headache.
Plus?
I don’t care for white wine.
So . . . yeah.
Yeah now I’m thinking maybe I should ask you to delete that comment about where I work. The paranoia is seeping in lol.
Stupid need for secrets. Though I don’t mind you knowing. :)
Done, lovely you.
Deleted.
Thank you!
I’ll be over here in the corner, nursing a nice Hefeweizen or maybe just reminiscing about Caffrey’s Irish Cream Ale.
I am pretty much the opposite of a beer snob. Smooth and blond and malty. Yum.
Making beer sour fruitish?
Blech.
Cameron -
Yes . . . blech.
Serious blech.
And now I want a beer!
And I have IPA!
Yay!
I must disagree. I rarely do that with you. Love love love the “sour” beers! I’ve only been to that place once and I think other sour beer made in Belgium are better, but I like to support the local guys too.
Have you tried Hopworks? They make an IPA you would like. And Racer 5, out of somewhere in CA. That is a very hoppy IPA too.
It’s good to know what you like. :)
Heather -
As I said, there were many happy drinkers at Cascade.
So you are not alone in your wrongness.
Snort!
Of course I have been to Hopworks!
Yum!
I have had beers like these.
Horrific, awful, a travesty.
BUT I have also had what these beers should have been. Tangy and fruity. More like those alcoholic soda-pops. I prefer IPAs also. And even though I am a horrific beer snob, I too would drink Coors to avoid drinking those beers your genius ordered.
I’m really disappointed with Mark. He should have known better.
Brandi -
OK, but guess what?
This place is getting RAVE reviews. They are making their beer EXACTLY as they want to be making it. Really.
Mark should have known better.
Hee hee!
I love when Mark does not know better.
ick!! i am not a fancy beer girl at all….give me a bottle of bud light, and i’m good! :) even fruity martini’s are not that great to me (except for a gingerbread martini that my hubby mixed up – that thing is YUMMMMMMY!!!).
yes, sour beers sound icky.
and LMAO your comment bill! dipping by a stunt johnson!! bahahahahahaaahaaa!!
I am not a fruity beer kind of girl.
A slice of lime in a Negro Modelo.
That’s it.
I like beer to taste like beer.
And BILL IS HILARIOUS!
Did you see my answer?
Stay tuned.
I have never been a fan of beer.
And now I can honestly say I”ll never drink beer, jewel toned, with an orange, cherry, blueberries…no matter what the trend is!!!
Yuck!
Adriana -
I am so glad to have saved you from this barfy swill.
High fives!
High fives and wishes that I could clear my memory of the tastes of those beers.
Ick.
Oh, yuk, yes, I have tasted vomit beer before, and the only thing it’s good for is making regular beer taste like nectar of the gods!
After a sip of that vomit beer, and guzzled my regular beer like I had been fished out of a dessert cave after 10 years.
Alexandra -
Yes! My IPA was just OK, but after tasting the vomit beer?
My IPA was like nectar from the gods.
It so was.
OK, and dessert cave is making me giggle.
I imagine you in an enormous hollowed out sponge-cake.
Hee hee!
Kris, it’s like you were in my living room tonight. Well, if I had a living room. I guess it’s a family room. But anyway, hubs and I watched “Beer Wars” last night, some documentary, and now he’s all on YouTube watching videos of peeps making their own beer and all that.
And he Googled IPA, so we both learned all about that.
And then in my email? Your post, which made me laugh and gag at the same time. Especially the sucking-on-the-rag thing.
Oh god, you’re too funny!
Sherri -
Mark loves Beer Wars! I posted about that show once a while back . . . an episode on which they were making spit beer.
ACK!
Mark is reading my post right this minute and he is giggling hysterically at the rag image.
Yay!
Love that.
And, uh…yes, I know..it should be DESERT single S cave.
But, DESSERT double s cave works, too, you know, like a diabetic sugar coma…
Hee hee!
I am mocking you.
And now I want sponge cake.
Damn it.