Worst beer?

[arjay]

Back in the late '70s the EM club at the Yorktown CG Reserve Training Center served Schlitz Dark on tap. I never saw it offered for sale anywhere else.

A buddy of mine routinely ordered a large pitcher and always insisted I help him with finishing it. The stuff looked and tasted like diesel fuel. To this day I don't know why I never turned him down...

I remember buying pitchers of that in some saloon on the hill in the mid 70s.
We rubes thought it was exotic lol

 

[DWalt]

My "youth beer" was Goebel's (I think it was brewed in Cincinnati). It was less than a dollar per six pack. I seem to remember it came in the squatty glass throw-away bottles with caps. It was OK, certainly at that price. When I lived in Cleveland, several of the supermarket chains had house-brand beers. I don't remember those being so bad.

 

[loknload]

Back in my youth out of the great city of Philadelphia there was Schmidt's beer,
the worst beer to me there ever was!
My father in law used to have Milwaukee's Best,,, that was an award winner as well!

 

[swsig]

Any beer labeled "Light" or "Lite".

 

[ParadiseRoad]

...the question is...

...will it pass the blindfold test...

 

[rockquarry]

Is Schlitz still produced? I haven't had one in at least thirty, maybe forty years, but can get a headache just thinking about Schlitz...I can't imagine any domestic beer worth drinking except maybe Shiner's and that would be if nothing better was handy.

 

[The Last Standing Knight]

In the late '60's we could buy OB beer at the EM club in Japan. 5 cents a bottle. Terrible stuff but it gave a whole new meaning to dollar beer night.

OB! Ewwww! Tasted like embalming fluid (probably was). I made jokes about it that could not be printed here. Singha in Thailand was pretty bad, too.

 

[Muss Muggins]

Easy. "BEER." White can, black letters, "BEER." $1.29 a six pack. "LIGHT BEER" was much better. The can actually looked like this. A brown can followed, but didn't change the taste . . .

 

[The Last Standing Knight]

Bao Me Ba (phonetic spelling), with the distinctive "33" label, a delightful brew made with pure DaNang river water (the sewer of southeast Asia).

While in Vietnam we were limited by military orders. Four cases of beer per month, or 4 quarts of liquor (not both), with a ration card required for purchase at the PX 'Class 6' stores (only in secure rear areas where many of us seldom had occasion to go). Beer was usually available (Schlitz, Red Stripe, couple of Filipino brands, occasionally Japanese brands) priced at $2.40 per case. When available, liquor such as Jim Beam, Canadian Club, and other popular brands were priced at about $1.90 per quart. Everything was tax-free (no Federal excise taxes, no state taxes, etc) so we got a real education in the effects of taxation on retail pricing!

While I was in Vietnam the price of cigarettes (popular brands) went up from $1.70 to $1.90 per carton (also tax-free), and this nearly caused insurrection in the ranks (we were limited by rationing to 4 cartons per month).

The "buddy system" helped a lot. A non-smoker could easily trade his cigarette ration for another guy's liquor ration. The black market took care of most other needs, probably better than any military supply lines (and the rationing system was largely enforced as a means of curbing the black market).

Another story entirely could be told of the corruption within the military clubs system (officers clubs, NCO clubs, enlisted mens clubs), with dozens of high-ranking NCO's and officers going to prison for trafficking in liquor, beer, cigarettes, and other essentials.

Worst beer I ever had was pretty good at the time, even when it cost more than it should have and no ice was available.

Didn't S/Sgt Barry Sadler once write and sing a cute little ditty about this beer?

 

[Broke Hoss]

From my youthful rodeo days; Coors, flowed freely from many a pickup toolbox behind the chutes.

Then Willie & Waylon had us drinking Lone Star with the armadillo at Luchenbach.

But when I went in the Army in 77, we managed just fine with PBR, Schlitz & Oley.

I can't say any of them sound particularly good to me now. We have some local crafts that are really good & I'm a fan of Shiner.

 

[RobertJ.]

It was a toss-up between Old English 800 and Rainier Ale. They'd both do what you wanted them to do, though.

My favorite was considered a bad beer by most. Blitz, made by Weinhard, was what beer was supposed to taste like.

As I write this, I can't remember the last time I drank any beer, good or bad.

 

[RobertJ.]

Back in the day, Schlitz used to have this reputation amongst my crowd. What's the current consensus?

But what about about Shlitz Stout Malt, "the Bull"? It was a favorite around here, back in the day.

 

[REM 3200]

most American beers would qualify as worst

Gotta agree. After living in Europe (mostly Germany) for 8 years.
I prefer German Alt and Dunkel beers. My all time favorite German beer
is Hefeweizen (unfiltered wheat beer with a high yeast content) as served in Bavaria.

 

[Rustyt1953]

Dad kept Burger, Hudepohl, Weidemann and Schoenling in the house. When I turned 16, he told me that if I ever wanted a beer to ask for it and he would give me one. He said that if I ever snuck one it would be my last.

What a guy.

 

[500SNW]

Dad kept Burger, Hudepohl, Weidemann and Schoenling in the house. When I turned 16, he told me that if I ever wanted a beer to ask for it and he would give me one. He said that if I ever snuck one it would be my last.
What a guy.

Too bad they don't make Little Kings Cream Ale any more. That was "West Sider" beer. The Schoenling family lived in my neighborhood, so Little Kings was always abundant in the 70's and 80's.

 

[Bugkiller99]

Carling Black Label. Stripped paint and varnish off with one application.

 

[rustythread]

Gotta agree that generally, the German beers I drank in Bavaria were the best. However, the Gruner ( imagine an umlaut over the u) beer on tap at the Wurzburg EM club in '65 and '66 was the worst swill imaginable.

 

[kozmic]

One of the mind numbing number of senseless, corny and childish games my golf partner and I play during our league is that we bet a beer on who is closest to the pin after three shots on the 2 par 5s (aslong as the ball is in bounds). The only caveat is that the looser chose the beer (he has to drink the same beer). I won both holes last night and drank 2 "Space Kitty" craft beers. Even free they weren't particularly good. Potent, but "not my cup of tea".

 

[ParadiseRoad]

...back when I was a paper boy 50+ years ago...someone snuck a case of Carling Black Label to us at our newspaper sub station at 3 am one Sunday morning...

...we folded and loaded our papers onto our bikes...then drank our fill...

...and proceeded to conduct a very "colorful" morning of newspaper delivery...

 

[REM 3200]

My Dad used to tell a story about the worst beer he ever saw.
During WW2, He was a Company Commander in the Pacific. When the company would
get its beer ration, all different brands of beer, it was delivered in the back of a duce & ½.
Dad would line up the company and have them choose their case of beer. Lowest Private first,
then the second lowest next and so on up to the 1st SGT. Then the officers, 2LTs first then the 1LT XO.
Dad, as a Capt and commander, got what was left. It was always "Rupert Beer".
He hated the stuff until he died.