Maple Brown Ale
Appalachian Brewing Company

The appearance of the beer is significantly darker than I would expect from a brown ale. The beer has a fairly minimal head with negligible carbonation.

Smell: Fairly off-putting on the nose with significant sweetness. The maple and warm brown sugar is present mostly in the nose, but there is a component of something borderline rancid.

Taste: The beer is really quite bitter, with significant components of very roasty tasting malts. The whole tongue is coated with flavor immediately. There's a bit of a burnt toast flavor with notes of stale acidic, oxidized coffee.

Feel: A thick beer, especially for a brown ale, which is in line with the color and taste. This beer is hard to drink because of the flavors and mouth-feel.

Overall: If I had to drink this beer, I'd wait until the winter. I drank this beer in the middle of the summer which wasn't terribly enjoyable. I chose this beer in a make your own sixpack and was quite disappointed in the selection. I was hoping for the maple to come across more in the flavor, but it just added subtle sweetness. The beer is not at all watery, possessing a strong and consistent (albeit unenjoyable) flavor.

I had this on tap during the release at Appalachian Brewing company in Harrisburg, served chilled in a pint.

The color is dark cocoa brown with translucent clarity and thin beige cap with fine bead and lace sticks well, the head retention is good. The smell has a moderate amount of malt with slightly sweet nose and mild toasted grain accent with some woody perhaps maple odors and light yeast ester. The feel is good with moderate sweetness level and semi-high carbonation, the alcohol influence on the palate is mild and the finish has a semi-dry texture with a balanced overall feel.

The flavor is pretty good with a nice toasted grain flavor up front leading to some caramel and maple type sweet flavors with mild candy-like middle and some yeast fruitiness in the taste with slight woody hop flavor accenting and mild residual sugar rounding out the finish. The flavor and drinkability of this brown is better than average, I would order this again since it had a decent amount of taste, the only qualm is it is a little sweet for the style.

*disclaimer* Please forgive me if my review is not perfect/accurate, I am still relatively new to the craft beer scene, especially reviewing. I may use the wrong/inadequate words to describe what I had, contact me and give me some constructive feedback.

Appalachian Brewing Company released the new Maple Brown Ale last night (7/25/2013), the official description is as follows:
"This smooth ale was created using crystal and chocolate malts balanced with high alpha American hops. The use of maple syrup offers an unparalleled mouth feel and smoothness for the dark beer lover in all of us.
OG 14.5 | FG 2.4 | ABV 6.2 | IBUs 33"

Living in the Harrisburg area, and having been to the main ABC location a few times, and enjoyed a few of their beers, I figured I'd head there with some friends to try the new limited brew.

Appearance: Very dark, akin to a stout or porter, with a thin, half-finger head on top.

Smell: Smoky and rich, complex.

Taste: Taste comes on strong, as an ale should, and then slides into the sweet maple-ness.

Mouthfeel: Thicker than the ales I'm previously used to, but not quite as thick as a stout.

Overall: Pretty good, interesting to try once, but I probably won't get it again if it's still available next time I'm at ABC.

Serving Type: on-tap, in an Appalachian Brewing Company pint glass, at ABC's Harrisburg brewpub.