Wednesday, November 2, 2011

Game Day Beer Review: Bayerische Staatsbrauerei Weihenstephan Festbier Marzen



(5.80% ABV)  Continuing with our Fall beer theme, we'll head back to Germany for an offering from one of Germany's oldest brewers, Weihenstephaner's Festbier:

Festbier appears a clear golden color, almost a crystal-clear, brassy gold, with only a small whitish head that quickly fades away into just a memory. The smell reminds me more of a Pilsner than anything else.

On tasting, I'm getting some straw, and just a hint of yeast, followed by a fairly sweetish malt finish.  This is your classic German beer, although I don't quite understand why it's labeled a festbier, or treated as a Marzen -- 'cause if it is, it's like no other Marzen I've ever had. 

What it is, instead, is a perfectly carbonated, well-balanced and refreshing beer, and one I could drink all day long -- in the Springtime. I'm wondering if Weihenstephaner is playing a Halloween trick on us, the drinking public, with the release of this beer in the Fall.

It's fairly decent, but it's not an Oktoberfest beer. B-, more for being off-style than anything else.

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