Sly Fox Maibock

Brewed by Sly Fox Brewing Company
Style: Heller Bock
Pottstown and Phoenixville, Pennsylvania USA

Serve in Dimpled mug, Stein

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Draft from a keg right after the race -- this running of the ruminants featured not one, but two three-legged participants, including two-time winner, Peggy, and this year’s champion, Simon. Deep but still transparent orange with a lacing bright white head. Taste is semi-dry with low bitterness, great light lager body, honey and light white grape and middle-of-the-road malt. Not very different from their heller Bock; this one’s just named after a goat!

Draft at the goat race. Pours a cloudy deep copper-brown with some beige head and light lace. Notes of caramel, honey, butterscotch, some mild citrus. Light bitterness on the finish.

Tap from SideBar in WC. A reddish-brown pour with no head when it arrived from a freshly tapped keg. Caramel and hops I pick up from the aroma right away. It has a nice sticky palate with a medium-thin body. Good, not great but definitely not a disappointment.

Tap at the stagshead. Pours golden with thin white head. Not much on nose. Tastes of honey, grains, basement, floral, and light caramel. Kinda boring lager buts crisp and not unpleasant

UPDATED: MAY 14, 2013 2012 Peggy at Maibock Fest. Pours golden with foamy white head. Lager, hay, grass over sweet malt base. Smooth, heavy body. Very sweet. Low bitterness. Hard to remember after the other 5 beers. 2013 Simon is similar.

(Draught, labeled 3 Legged Peggy) Pours a clear copper body with a spare white head. Aroma of caramel, earth, and bread. Flavor of fruit (mango, orange), caramel, and bread.

Brown in color with a heavy, mildly worty caramel aroma and a grainy munichy (vienna) taste. Neither bad, nor exceptional.

In short: A golden lager a bit on the sweet side of things. Not what I’m looking for in this style
How: Tap at brewpub, Phoenixville location. One of the RBSG 2011 bus-trip pit-stop. Sold as “3 Legged Peggy Maibock”, I’m assuming this is the same beer as the one simply called Maibock
The look: Clear golden topped by a small white head
In long: Typical lager nose with also some forest floor and soft candies. Taste has grainy oily cereals, soft candies, a bit of caramel, soft white bread, some herbal hops, some citrus fruits, a light herbal spiciness sensation. Active tickling carbonation. Like a cranked up version of their Helles Golden Lager I had minutes before. It is nourishing but not the most refreshing of lager (especially for a maibock that I usually find refreshing). A little too sweet for the style. That style of beer should be very sessisonnable, this one wasn’t. Overall this was a boring lager but I would be lying if I said that drinking this beer again is the last thing I will ever do. The last thing I will ever do is die.

On tap at Pinocchio’s, Media, PA. Didn’t think I was in the mood for this kind of style, but Sly Fox’s variant turned out to be nicely appetizing. Deep golden pour with a medium head and good retention. Strong yeasts and malts in the nose, to be sure, but there was also a bright hop presence that was unexpected. The flavors were consistent with this hybrid quality, and the base maibock held together the dry noble hops and a fruity, bready quality that seemed to flirt with biere de garde. Pretty nice.

Draft, RBSG bus tour. Crystal clear amber body, small white head. Aroma is moderately sweet, bread, caramel, some orange. Taste is moderately sweet, earthy/orange, some caramel. Sticky medium body.