Coney Island Freaktoberfest

Shmaltz Brewing Company
Brewed at Olde Saratoga Brewing (Mendocino Brewing Co.)
Style: Oktoberfest/Märzen
San Francisco, California USA

bottle, pours red amber with a thin white head. Aroma is toasted malt, alcohol, and yeast. Flavors are very sweet malt, some awekward sour almond and a lingering bittersweet finish.

Bottle purchased at North Coast. Pour certainly gets your attention, rich vibrant red with a thick pink foam. Sadly, the novelty wear off when you realize that this is not that tastey. The usual light sweet wheat notes of a marzen is replaced with a cheap lager flavor. Passable.

Draft at redlight redlight. Pours an unnatural red, which is after all the point. Hints of fall spices in the nose that don’t come out in the flavor. Really not particularly tasty. Funny gimmick but not a great beer.

You expect a sour beer when you see the red color. It is crisp but not quite refreshing. More of a lager than a marzen. Not bad.

Wow! Weird, freaky scarlet pour, and a funny label. The aroma is mixed - there is some skank mixed in with the mellow hops. A lightly sweet marzen flavor, with good hops. I wonder where the color comes from. There are probably beets and beet sugar added, maybe some food coloring. I don’t taste any berries. Nice hop and beet sugar finish - a fun brew!

Serving: 22 oz. bottle. Appearance: Deep red with a pink fizzy head that is gone in seconds. What the hell is this stuff? Aroma: Chemical nose (red #5??) with notes of grain in an otherwise very light nose. Flavor: Some sweet malt notes and a bit of grain, but otherwise very uninspiring. Palate: Medium carbonation with a medium-light, slightly dry mouthfeel and a short finish. Overall: A gimmick beer that really isn’t worth trying. Plus it is just strange drinking a Marzen that is this color. Skip this one.

Bottle. Small pink fizzy mostly diminshing head, fair amount of lacing, fizzy, fast-rising, lively carbonation, and a reddish-pink body. The aroma lightly malty, sweet and lightly hoppy. Ditto for the flavor and tasted thin. Tingly mouthfeel. The body color caught me off guard, did not care too much for what flavor there was and to me this is a novelty beer. Not a beer I will revisit.

TAP: ruby red pour, sweet malty nose. Taste is an odd sweet malt, strange color that kind of catches you off guard when trying to pick out the Oktoberfest elements.