Coney Island Freaktoberfest

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

I just can’t get over this beer. Pours a blood red, which freaked me out and likely ruined a lot of my experience with it, has a thin pinkish hued head, and minimal carbonation. Aroma slighly hoppy, strong malt, and a taste that I can’t place (probably in my mind). Flavor matches and isn’t that bad, but I can’t get over it. I would drink it again only for novelty purposes.

Freaky, indeed. This beer is blood red - somewhat alarming if you are not warned about the color ahead of time. The beer tastes... red. Maybe because I could see it was red, I felt like there was a bitter dye taste in the beer. Of course, that could just have been hops. I think this would score best in a novelty beer category, and wonder if they will make a green beer for St. Patrick’s Day? Palate seemed red. no. seemed fine. i’m giving it a 4 for appearance strictly for creativity. I think if this beer was in a literal blind testing, it might not be identified as an Oktoberfest.

In the bomber bottle from Gomers ($4.99). Imagine my surprise when the damn thing poured out blood red with a pink head! A mild hoppy floral aroma, but a huge poisonous hop bitterness to the taste. This was an unpleasant and brutal bitterness that nature evolved our palates into a decisive warning through revulsion. I keep wanting to say that there’s some cranberry mixed up in there somewhere, but that might just be from the tongue paralysis. I don’t need to be tricked by this spook of a beer again.

Warm, chemic, not as malty as I would have liked. Little bitter, and it taste like the stage blood they used to make it red.

Bomber. Pours hazy brick red with a thin pink head. Raspberry, dust, flowers and bread show up vaguely in the aroma. Light body and carbonation. Not much happening in the taste before a somewhat earthy, astringent and bitter finish. This one is kinda hard to picture as an Oktoberfest/Märzen. Maybe a strangely concocted fruit beer?

Bottle. Pours clear red with an average, pink, fizzy head, somewhat lasting with fair lacing. Aroma is average malt (grain, meal, cereal), average hop (herbs, grass), average yeast (dough) with notes of wet paper and dust. Medium bodied, gritty texture, average carbonation, and a bitter-dry finish. Long duration, light sweetness, moderate acidity and bitterness. Blah.

I’ve never seen a Märzen this red. Was there grenadine in there? Too sweet for me, but I forced it down anyway. Isn’t that the responsible thing to do?

The only part of this beer I enjoyed was the phenomenal bottle art, the detailed cap, and the stunningly rich red-velvet body. The rest was very simple and uninteresting. Light sweetness with an underlying doughy character. Chalky with dry grassy notes. Reminded me of when Heniz made purple ketchup for awhile in the early-mid 00’s - try as I might I could never get past the purple ketchup soaking into my hamburger bun. Shocked me enough to get me off my childish ketchup kick and onto a real man’s condiment; the family of Mustards.