Duckabush Brown Ale
Silver City Brewery & Taproom

Silver City's Duckabush Brown is named for a local river, which itself is named for the reddish color of nearby bluffs. Perhaps a red ale would have been more well suited to the name. Either way, this beer doesn't shine for body or drinkability and was served to me in a state of near spoilage six weeks after its release date. It is cinnamon brown with a pronounced sweetness reminiscent of peppermint stick. There's even a current of root beer afoot.

But the thin body, intrusive phenols, and lack of clean lines need serious correction.

 

I'm unsure what to make of this beer. It seems that Don Spencer decided to make a lighter bodied dark beer as a fall seasonal. It's listed as a brown, but doesn't have any of what I would consider to be classic brown characteristics aside from mouthfeel. This isn't a brown ale drinkers, it's a brown for blonde ale drinkers.

Appearance: Lighter than I would consider typical for the style, it's sort of a light oak in appearance.

Smell: All yeast in the nose, very little malt. Atypical from what I expect out of a brown.

Taste: Not as sweet as I expect. I'm accustomed to browns that assault you with malt in the front, and then sort of tail off to a mild malty finish. This has a very mild malt entry, and then tails off to a yeasty finish.

Drinkability: I'm probably the wrong person to judge, as I'm not a brown ale drinker. I could drink one, but not more, as it simply isn't my style.