Märzen Fest Bier
Switchback Brewing Company

Appearance: Purchased in Vermont a couple days shy of two months after the date of packaging. The pint can had a stick-on label with a season-appropriate orange color scheme under a simple graphic involving prosting steins surrounded by stemmed barley. The font was also characteristic of classic German Oktoberfest advertisements. Poured into a glass, it is tough to get more than once centimeter of dirty foam atop the beautiful harvest gold liquid. Bubble visibly rise through the crystal clear beer to the top but can't keep the heat intact, save for a ring and a thin topcoat. No lacing.

Aroma: Malt, store bought cereal, bread crust, sweet rolls, caramel, honey.

Taste: Malt and grains, a touch of sweetness which may be interpreted as caramel. The bread seems warmed rather than toasted. Hop bitterness offsets the sweetness detected on the nose but it's still there.

Feel: Moderate to full with good carbonation. If there is any dryness it goes away quick.

Overall: Like many American lagers using the "Oktoberfest" moniker, it is billed as a marzen and a fest bier; therefore it shouldn't come as much surprise that the beer has characteristics of both variations while retaining its own Yankee qualities. They did a good job with it save for the abundance of sweetness.

Pairing: To nobody's surprise, this Vermont marzen loved to be put up against a macaroni dish with ham and Vermont cheeses in its home state. The breadiness of the beer perfectly complimented the breadcrumbs atop the pasta, plus it had enough crispness and carbonation to cut through the pork fat and cheese blend.

Not bad, no foam, good carbonation, nice malt backbone, the taste is very mild (mostly the malt). Has nothing to do with the original bavarian Märzen.

Poured from a 12 oz stubbie into a pint glass; no birth date. Pours caramel brown with minimal foam head or lacing. Tastes of sweet caramel with apparent malt backing; not a malt bomb and very pleasant. Very good for the style.

From a stubby 12oz bottle dated 8/12/21 into a pint glass.

Pours a hazy orangish red with about one finger of off-white head. Probably the haziest marzen I've ever seen. Ok lacing and retention.

Smells bready with some caramel.

Taste follows the nose. Fairly sweet.

Fairly full-bodied for the style. Slight bitter aftertaste. Medium carbonation.

Overall, I've had better marzens, but this was nice enough.

 

 

Pours a copper color with a finger of head. The nose has notes of bread, earth and nuts. The flavor is mildly bready with some caramel essence and a relatively light body.

Bottled on 8/28/20

Pours a translucent copper body with bright orange accents and topped with a sliver of creamy, off-white foam; sub-par head retention yields a spotty veil of cap, a light, bubbly, yet frothy collar, and a limited amount of dense, webby lacing clinging to the glass.

Aroma features a touch of caramel beneath a rounded, expressive yeast upfront; some honey and brown sugar accent bread dough and black bread crusts over the middle before earthy spice with a more pronounced caramel/toffee undertone and a full, yeasty presence resumes on the close.

Taste opens with caramel malts and a more subdued yeastiness than the aroma would indicate; fresh toast, black bread crust, and dried grass build over the mid-palate into a finish of bitter pine, floral earth, and briefly lingering resin before a final impression of soft white bread.

Mouthfeel brings a light body alongside an extensive, evenly dispersed, and moderate-high carbonation, which fades across a clean mid-palate with a mild background indication of a hoppy acidity advancing; an exceptional dryness presents briefly as a gritty spritz on the back end phases into a bittering quality on the finish/swallow.

A fairly comprehensive malt foundation made sloppy and inconsistent by a largely unwelcome C-hop presence layering the latter half of the beer with bitterness and an awkward-for-the-style resinous quality; while this beer does remains drinkable, its indecisive approach is a more lasting turn-off to repeatability.

 

 

 

 

On tap at the brewery

OK. Glad I tried it but wouldn’t take it home.

 

 

 

 

This was poured into a mug. The appearance was a ruddy burnt orange color with a slim almost finger’s worth of white to off white foamy head that dissipates to a concave sticky round-about lacing sticking in a messy sort of way. The smell started out with a dried caramel malts with a gentle earthy dry nuttiness to it. The taste rounds out to a balance between the previously noted flavors. Once again, the dried caramel leads into the aftertaste and giving off a quick subtle crisp finish. On the palate, this one sat about a light to medium on the body with a sly roasty nuttiness drying over my palate gently. Overall, its an okay o-fest/marzen. I don’t mind it for me, but fans of o-fests/marzens, eh maybe, give it a shot, maybe you might like it a tad more than me.