McKenzie French Country Spring Beer

Brewed by McKenzie Brew House
Style: Bière de Garde
Glen Mills, Pennsylvania USA

Date: 11/01/2006
Mode: Hand Bottled
Source: Tasting

hazy dark gold, frothy off white head, strands of lace, sweet fruity aroma, nice fruity flavor with great yeasty spicyness, light bitterness,

Aroma: 6/10; Appearance: 7/10; Flavor: 7/10; Palate: 6/10; Overall: 13/20
Rating: 3.3/5.0
Drinkability: 7/10
Score: **+/4

(Draught) Pours a lightly hazy golden body with a small white head. Aroma of grass, florals, herbs, and nuts. Flavor of earth, florals, grass, nuts, cloves, and huskiness with a moderately bitter finish.

On tap at the Malvern location. Poured a medium and lightly hazy golden color with a small sized head. Aromas of pices, some grains, citrus, and yeasty. Tastes of spices, grains, bread, and citrus.

Hand-bottle courtesy of Dickinsonbeer, sampled in November 2006: Pours a clear golden with a thin-lacing wispy white head. Mild, lightly sweet, toasty pale malty aroma has a nice, bready yeasty balance. Starts sweet and biscuity malty with a nice balance of lightly bittering hops toward a drier, floral bittersweet finish. A true to style and enjoyable brew!

Had this at the Malvern Brew Fest. The pour was hazy deep straw. The aroma was complex, providing notes of orange, lemon, hops, barnyard, some spicy florals, and some Italian spices. The palate was lively, with taste notes of citrus and hops up front, backed by spicy florals and barnyardy yeasts. I found myself returning multiple times to the Mckenzie booth to get more of this stuff.

Poured a hazy golden color with a medium almost white head. Sweet and malty aroma with some citrus and yeasty notes. Light orange. The flavor was sweet and mildly fruity. Malty flavor overall with some yeasty spice on the finish.

Poured a dark golden color with a small, off white head that left no lacing on the glass. Aroma of citrus hops, earthy yeast, vanilla, spices, funky barnyard, hay and dough. Taste went from tart and sour, citrus fruits, light maltiness, with a dry, light alcohol finish.

Draught pint on 10/6/06 with Dickinsonbeer. Malvern location.
Frothy white head rises up exuberantly atop a wonderfully conditioned (clear) amber-copper body with light marigold and peach tints. Retention is only moderate but light rings of lace are left behind.
Deep and earthy at first, the yeast and strisselspalts combine to give both a soily, mineral-like note that is then joined by some bready, moderately sweet malts. Like a rainy Spring day, some muted/wet herbal-grassiness is present on the end, as well as a fair amount of hop bitterness (moreso than expected). The malt is well-extracted and quite highly represented, as it should be for a biere de garde. Perhaps a little more fruitiness would give it more of a defining "biere de mars" character and the strisselspalt, while interesting, don’t quite provide as dry or lilacy an aroma as I would anticipate. Aroma strength is medium to medium-high, with no alcohol or brewing flaws perceived.
Sweet and chewy at first, with notes of thick, gooey white bread, almond paste, vanilla and light acids from the yeast, it certainly begins as more than a mouthfull. But it dries out significantly, with a very high amount of bittering hops for the style and plenty of tanginess and light grassiness. Minimally fruity, though some yellow fruits and black cherries do come to mind upon warming, I get more of an earthy, soily, damp-leaf effect from the hops. The mouthfeel shows medium amounts of fairly engaging carbonation matched by a softness from the malts. A bit too much acidity does build on the finish, however, be it from the hops or the yeast. Very drinkable though, and if I wasn’t so spoiled from trying McKenzie’s other (top-notch) Belgian styles, this might stand out more.