Macadocious Maibock
Denizens Brewing Riverdale Park Production House & Taproom

 

 

 

Picked up a sixer at Downtown Crown in Gaithersburg to brighten my weekend. The big head and sweet bread note brimming with malt are a pretty good start. The bread note continues in the taste and is joined by some dark fruit notes bordering on boozy, and some spicy hop bitterness that blasts in late. This has a complex play in three acts and despite some shakiness in the finish, I feel this one is good value for time and money.

From the 12 oz can, it pours a clear golden color with a modest white head that soon diminishes to nothing. The nose gets a nice dose of malt with some spice. The mouth follows with a nice maltiness followed by a hop bite, leaving a lingering bitterness in the mouth.

12 oz can poured into a tulip pint glass. There is a lot of great malt character here - biscuit, bready, some caramel - but the herbal/spicy/citrusy hops pack too much of a bitter punch that keeps building with each sip towards an unpleasant astringency. It's VERY close to being excellent, but the bitterness is just too much.

This is one of them beer names that sounds a lot better in your head than it looks when printed on the can. I pity the poor barkeep who has to listen to people attempt to pronounce it.

Anyhow, pour is great. A bit light for a maibock, but still a rather inviting dark, filtered orange with a voluminous head.

Aroma is well on point for the style but better than the vast bulk of American iterations: light but intentionally well-crafted, malty, with heavy nodes of biscuits and caramel alongside a wee bit of bocky tang.

Flavor is, likewise, very good. Borderline great. Again, I'm speaking in terms of the style and I know these are out of fashion, but I've seen plenty otherwise competent American brewers screw up maibocks. Biscuits and caramel up front, sweet but not too intense. A bit of hops in the middle along with more floral malt nodes, and then a lingeringly sweet finish.

Perfect for when you’re craving Narraganset but want to get drunk! Hoppier and slightly sweeter than most lagers.

 

 

Amber/gold appearance with a small white head a light lacing. Moderately sweet malt aroma, light toastiness. Smooth, clean taste of spicy, herbal, floral hops. Dry, medium bodied finish.

Poured from the can into a pokal style glass. Canned March 5th 2020.

Very nice looking brew here. Pale copper and brown bodied, with maybe just a hint of red color to it. Very clear nearly crystal like in appearance, with an excellent solitary ream of fine carbonation. Big rich frothy off white colored head, with swiss cheese bubbles and good staying power. Very nice looking bock.

Solid aroma. Very good sense of crispy brown bread like toast on the nose. A sweet caramel and clean sense comes through as well. There is a large dryness to this as well which seems to bring and odd flavor to the hops which are quite small. Some faint hints of peanut butter strangely as well.

Palate hits interestingly. Sharp sensing malt sweetness, with a bit of an alcohol kick. Hits with a good amount of astringent bitterness that is somewhat spicy and herbal, particularly on the aftertaste. A faint touch of caramel sweetness manages to bring some of it back into alignment. However, a good portion of the aftertaste is distinctly boozy.

There's a bit of fussel like heat to this which is a little much, but otherwise there's some good lager to enjoy here.