Due to scheduling conflicts with work, the BC4M had another weekly meeting moved to a Wednesday. Snake, Bim, and Fred descended on casa de Wilder for a quick tasting session. With only 6 beers to rate, the night promised to be fast paced. First up was R.J. Rocker's Bell Ringer (8.5%) which was brought to us by one of J. Wilder's harem of beer smugglers who had risked life, limb and booty to score a few beers for us from the Piggy Wiggly (also known as Hoggly Woggly) in charming Goose Creek, South Carolina (or South Cackalacky for those in the know). This is easily the best beer RJ makes cause every other beer we try from him usually sucks. Smooth but not overpowering, this is a fortified malt grenade that smacks you in the chops and demands your respect. Everyone was surprised by the quality of this beer (maybe RJ was out of town and a guest brewer actually made this) and it got a solid good. Next up was Founders Old Curmudgeon Ale (9.8%) which featured an artists rendition of Fred's happier identical twin brother on the label. Sweet at first, the aftertaste left the feeling of having sipped a little fermented rhubarb, but the more we drank the better this got. "Apricot brandywine" said Johnny, and Fred chimed in "a sweet elixir, strong and rich". Bim stated "not thick, but still a great body" which we assumed he meant for the beer, not Wilder's cute labrador retriever. Ellicottsville Brewery's Pantius Droppus (11.5%) was next and it tasted like Tang in a bottle. Ladies, we agree the name is catchy and each member of the BC4M (with the possible exception of D-Rail) love to see a nice whaletail drop, but this crap was plain awful. It tasted so bad that Fred exclaimed, "this couldn't entice a $10 a night midget hooker to lose her grundle grippers", while Bim chimed in, "there is a reason why no one has ever heard of these guys, this shit sucks!" Most of us poured this napalm out with the exception of J. Wilder, who wouldn't throw out kerosene if it came from a beer bottle. Amazingly, it completely bleached a rust stain off the sidewalk when we tossed it out, so maybe it is good for something. Lancaster Brewing's Hop Hog IPA (7.9%) was perhaps the weakest IPA any of us had ever tasted. Perhaps the wild boar on the label had chewed up all the hops, or maybe the guys that brew this in Pennsylvania thought it was illegal to import hops for brewing. Either way, this was weak as hell and rated a sucks. To try and remove the bad taste from our mouths, we opened a Dogfish Head Squall IPA (9.0%). "Unfiltered, unfettered and unprecedented" shouted the bottle that supposedly contained a 90 minute IPA that was simple bottle conditioned and naturally fermented. It poured into the glass like the insides of a snow globe and Snake said, "this is like a bottle of dandruff, but it sure is tasty". A lithograph on the bottle showed the fabled schooner S.S. Manshank which according to the History channel had successfully fought off a marauding band of French transvestite privateers aboard the La Damisole Locheur (which we think means the "The Lucky Pierre") off the coast of Assateague Island in 1834. This was a fine beer that Bim stated was "basic but yet quite good". The final beer of the night was from the state of Oregon's Deschutes Brewery Obsidian Stout (6.4%). Brewed with the left overs from the lava flow of Mt Saint Helens this was stout like in taste and color (very smooth with strong coffee and chocolate malt flavor) but paper thin in body. It got a so-so as it simply wasn't an above par stout. When we drink a stout, we want to have a viscous fluid that pours like a pint of molasses in January. After we finished up this superficial stout, we adjourned for the evening. Snake and Bim had to work the next day but J. Wilder and Fred stayed up to watch the hilarious movie Snatch (Da ya like Dags? Dags? Yeah d'ya like dags? Oh you mean DOGS) and Saturday Night Live skits featuring classics like (I got a fever and the only prescription is more cowbell) to end the evening. Next up is our road trip to the World Beer Fest in Richmond. Come out and join us as we attempt to rate another 40 or 50 beers, or at least get hammered trying. Until then,we leave you with the immortal words of legendary rock producer Bruce Dickinson, "I gotta have more cowbell baby!"
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