Its not a picnic without ants.

What is Picnic Day, you ask?

Well, for starters, today was Picnic Day in Davis, California. I went to the trouble of Googling the history of it, and apparently the first Picnic Day was held at UCDavis in 1909. So its wicked old. It's the largest student run event in the country, but for some reason people are surprised that it boils down to nothing more than a beer-soaked frat party. Why they continue to attempt to bill Picnic Day as a family friendly event is beyond me. Its a day long occasion where undergraduate Bros pull on their best v-necks tank tops, and slack-jawed woo-girls do everything they possibly can to make their parents ashamed of them.

But let's face it, I could talk about myself all day, so lets just go to the video:

If that video didn't capture all that is Picnic Day, I also have this photo of a guy we ran into at my favorite Chinese restaurant:

Don't get me wrong, there was also plenty of good, clean fun to be had, which I will represent here:

                        Making your own Harry Potter wand to support Sacramento literacy,
 Actual for-serious fencing,

                                                                                              And tiny dog hugging.

Bad Beers Come to Those Who Wait...

This is the white whale of redneck beers. I saw it once in a 30 rack, shortly after what I now refer to only as The Game Day Ice Experience, in which I vowed to never buy a 30 rack of experimental beer ever again.

However, this past weekend, while having a conversation with an employee at Grocery Outlet Bargain Market in which I found out I am known as "that woman who bought all that Game Day" (I am not kidding) I was lamenting that I had tried everything that had in the 'bad beer' category, I turned around to find a 6 pack Beer30 Light.

What?! That wasn't a sentence, you say? I'm a beer blogger, not a proper sentence writer.  

For those of you who were not raise in a barn, or a trailer, or some barn/trailer combination, "Beer30" is a response used when someone asks you what time it is and you indicate that its time to drink. What time is it, you ask? Why, its Beer30. And here's a hint: to some people, its always beer30.

There's apparently no regular Beer30; just Light and Ice, which I assume is why Beer30 Light has a 4% alcohol content. Lets face it, Beer30 Light is just regular Beer30, the fine people at Melanie Brewing in Wisconsin were just trying to class it up a bit.

I am losing faith in my previous go-to beer rating site. They ranked Beer30 Light at the same level as Game Day Light, which is clearly the problem with user generated ranking websites. People don't know a bad beer if it gag\s them as they drink it.

Back to the beer review. It looks more like a can of grape soda than beer. Modeled loosely off of the Bud Light can, the similarity stops there. Upon pouring, it had surprisingly good color. And good, however short-lived, head. It lost all carbonation almost immediately.

Luckily, didn't taste as sweet as it smelled. Instead it tasted a tiny bit like bleach. Kind of like drinking a beer at an indoor pool. It lacked any crispness, or refreshing quality. So, again, kind of like you were drinking the water at an indoor pool. On the bright side, there was very little aftertaste.

All in all, it's not a gag-inducing horror, but it isn't good either. Honestly, I find myself a little disappointed. I searched for this beer for months, and in the end, it was less of a white whale, and more of a giant plastic bag that I just thought was a whale from a distance, which happens to me a lot.

I give it a D+

Cheesy.

So, I've put myself on a diet which isn't anything new, but I'm actually doing a pretty good job at sticking with it to some degree. So, that's totally new.

I've lost a tiny amount of weight, but my face isn't any prettier, which leads me to believe by the time I reach my goal weight, I'll just look like a very svelte fruit bat. Why do people diet if they don't get prettier?! I feel lied to.

But moving on, prior to recently my diet consisted of only two key staples. Cheese and Beer. I've noticed now that I'm not eating as much we've got a cheese pile-up happening in our fridge.

I decided to compile a list of cheeses we've got in our fridge right now because just saying "We've got a lot of cheese!" didn't feel like enough. So, here it is, in no particular order:

Cabot Mild Cheddar slices
Cabot Garlic and Herb Cheddar
Cabot Tomato Basil Cheddar
Sorrento Trivia String Cheese (because I like to learn something when I eat my cheese!)
Cracker Barrel Sharp White Cheddar (I just now realized that I say "brarrel" not "barrel". I died a little)
Cracker Barrel Cracked Black Pepper Cheddar
Athenos Garlic and Herb Feta (which makes excellent Spanakopita, by the way)
Kraft shredded Mozzarella
Hahn's Cream Cheese
Kraft grated Parmesan Cheese

and finally, the greatest of all cheeses, sent to us by Michael's mother:
Cabot Seriously Sharp Hunters Cheddar - 2 lbs

I could make some VERY good macaroni and cheese. But I wont. ... Maybe I will.

I'm Walking on Mexican Sunshine

In an effort to fully immerse myself in learning Spanish, I decided to review the Mexican import Sol.

I'm just kidding. This has nothing to do with me trying to learn Spanish. Although, I did learn that "Sol" means "Sun" in this context, and is not a reference to the name Solomon. That makes the slogan "The Original Mexican Sunshine Beer" make a lot more sense, although they could have a great mascot in a guy name Sol. Just sayin'...

Moving on. I bought a 32 oz bottle of Sol for just over two dollars. It totes a 4.5% alcohol content, which is about average. The label, which apparently has not been altered since it's creation in 1890, is appealing in that "looks like something I might find in my grandparent's basement" sort of way. The beer itself has got good color, similar to a Corona.  

Upon pouring, I was made a little uncomfortable to the soapy foam that made rings around the bottle and stayed there for what seemed like minutes. And it smelled like pee.

Now is as good a time as any to mention that BeerAdvocate rated Sol at the same level of 7-11's Game Day Ice. At least I didn't have to buy twelve of them like I did when I reviewed Game Day. I've still got one of my fridge.

 Any takers? I didn't think so. 

With an introduction like that, its not hard to be pleasantly surprised. This highly carbonated beer was light and refreshing, had excellent bite, and no weird mouth-ruining aftertaste. It did, however, induce some rather terrible malt liquor burps.

I have to say this is one of the less stomach-turning beers I've had the pleasure of reviewing. It would have paired really well with spicy or salty food. I might actually buy this again (maybe).

Since I've gotten in the habit of rating these after drinking, I give Sol a solid C. For "C"ertainly not the worst beer I've ever had.

Gross Food Photography Rides Again!

I decided to take a break from gross beer to revisit one of my earlier passions: gross food photography. Also, I can'find any new gross beer. 

Last week I bought five frozen meals, and disappointed myself one lunch at a time. Starting with this:

                                 

By far the most expensive of my frozen meals, costing over two dollars, was this steam-fresh meal. When I started eating it, I was disgusted by what I thought were gross large mealy carrots. Upon reading the box, I discovered they were actually gross large mealy sweet potatoes. The texture was worse than the flavor. It was the easiest to prepare: four minutes in the microwave, and then eat. None of that, cut the film, then 2 minutes, then stir, then remove remaining film, then 2 minutes, then sit. I might as well just make a real lunch if I'm going to work that hard!

Next, lets play a game. The following two meals cost 88 cents each. I want you to guess which is chicken, and which is fish! (because who doesn't like to play with their food?)

Gross Meal Number One comes with completely odorless, flavorless Mac and Cheese and a brownie that bakes itself in the microwave (and goes everywhere):

Gross Meal Number Two also has flavorless Mac and Cheese, but comes with clumpy chocolate pudding for dessert:

If you guessed Meal Number One was chicken, you win! How did you know?! (If you were wrong, don't worry, I'm the only real loser here) Both 'meats' were grey, and although the 'chicken' tasted like raw corn meal, it still narrowly beat out the fish, which smelled more fishy than it tasted. You're welcome communal microwave.  

After two days of that, I decided to finish the week with a quick tour of Italy, starting with Manicotti in a red sauce:

No, that's not the bottom of a dumpster you're looking at, that's my lunch! Two tiny rolls of cheese filled pasta tucked into the corner of cardboard box of red sauce with suspicious black flakes in it. The cheese wasn't that bad, but I couldn't get over the pasta to sauce ratio. 99 cents for the meal, by the way.

Never in  the history of mankind has anyone looked forward to the end of the work week more than I did last week. My tour of Italy concluded with every frozen dinner maker's favorite bastardization: 

Chicken and Broccoli Alfredo.

Sponge-y chicken cubes smothered in fat sauce, with the tiniest suggestion of broccoli, and hard, dry pasta. Probably the best of the bunch, honestly. 

I'm ready to go back to gross beer now, please.

Beer Blog: Girl Drink Edition!

I was getting sick of having to drink terrible beers all the time, and seeing as "Beer30 ICE" was my only other unique option, I thought a nice girly drink review would be fun. Also, I can never, ever drink ice beer again. Never. Ever.

The girly drink of the evening is a locally produced cider called America's Best ACE Perry Hard Cider. "Perry Hard Cider" Not "Pear". "Perry". Apparently "perry" is an acceptable nickname for pear cider in the cider world, but I think they're just trying to get away with not using pears. Its got pictures of pears all over it, so I could assume it was probably pear-flavor-related, although the label has no mention of pears in the ingredients... Maybe they were just banking on me being a non-reader. BANK AGAIN AMERICA'S BEST!

America's Best website tells me not-surprising little about the actually cider, except that they have four flavors and they've been producing cider for 15 years. And then they shit all over the American brewing industry.  Fascinating stuff. I was shocked to see that it wasn't even listed on BeerAdvocate's site, until I remembered that it wasn't a beer. That make it a must less shocking revelation, and made me feel pretty stupid. Perry is a pretty new beverage, born in August of 2010, although its available in almost half of the states in the US, and it has a higher than expected ABV of 6%, which makes it one of the strongest beverages I've ever reviewed.

The cider poured an excellent yellow, extremely carbonated with copious amounts of head, which fizzled to almost nothing within seconds. The smell is off-putting; a strong, sour fart smell, which is not completely uncommon to ciders, but significantly worse than any I can remember. On a positive note, its got a taste that's best described as a liquid jolly rancher. They should really consider marketing this to kids, it would be a huge hit.

Lastly, its gluten-free, and lower in calories than beer or wine, which means when those kids --err, I mean.. women-- are sucking down these jolly ranchers, they don't have to worry about aggravating that gluten allergy their mom told them they have, or worse, getting fat.

Böner: "Its a hard sell"

Its Re-dick-ulous!!

As much as I giggled all the way to through the check-out line and brainstormed penis jokes all the way home, after doing a little research, I almost didn't write this review. 


Böner was created after the popularity of a t-shirt with the phrase "Pop a  Böner" on it actually made people want to drink the fictitious beer being advertised (may I suggest, if you try a Google Image Search you make sure to include the word "t-shirt". And even then. Don't. Just don't.). The whole concept just seemed cheap to me; Its like when companies starting brewing Duff Beer --currently only available in South America-- so people could drink the same beer as Homer Simpson. Böner Beer sales are completely driven by cheesy jokes and marketing ploys. As the website advertises, "Watch [insert sport here] with a Böner!", "Order a stiff one!", "It's sure to get a rise out of you!". They also have the "Böner girls" who are like, forty and all greased up, and not at all boner-inducing.  


So, if all the jokes are made, why review it? I have my reasons. Its brewed by the Lion Brewery in Pennsylvania, and only distributed/marketed in Texas. Never heard of Lion Brewery? Well, they were the maker of my FAVORITE no-longer-available cheap beer Brubaker. But that's review for another day. I've attached a link to the BeerAdvocate website if you want to learn more. Teaser: It was only available at a select few bars in Boston, and it was brewed in sticky re-used bottles. My point is Lion Brewery only seems to brew cheap, obscure, poorly distributed beverages and THAT, my friends, is a beer worth reviewing.  


The beer was brand new on the market as of 2011 and is already selling at discount grocery stores for $2.99 a six pack. That doesn't seem like a great sign. My first thought was "Of course it was marketed in Texas. Stupid Texas." But to be fair, nobody doesn't like a boner joke. In fact, I vote people stop saying love is the universal language, and just agree that its actually boners.

Its a wheat beer brewed with pineapple, which breaks my streak of only reviewing American Adjunct Lagers, but it means I have to drink a pineapple flavored wheat beer, which kind of sucks.  


My first reaction, and the ruining factor for my co-reviewer Mike, was the smell. It had that apple cider vinegar smell. He couldn't finish his glass. Its yeasty, which is probably something the marketers should have considered when they were deciding on what style beer to brew and name "Böner"; super yeasty? I would have stuck with American Adjunct Lager-- everybody else is doing it. 


Terrible head, but good color. And no after taste, which was a surprise. ...This whole review is a waste. I can't stop thinking about boners.