Dogfish Head My Antonia

More pilsner love over at Beer! today. Here's the Dogfish Head My Antonia:

Brewery: Dogfish Head Craft Brewery
Location: Milton, DE
Style: Pilsner
Brewery Website
Rating: B+

As my loyal readers know, pilsners are one of my favorite styles of beer. I was quite excited to see that Dogfish Head, one of my favorite breweries, recently released the My Antonia pilsner. It is not often that Dogfish Head produces a lager, so I was really interested in trying this out. The My Antonia pours up yellow-gold with a faint haze and a massive, white, clumpy foam head. The nose is almost all hops with citrus being the dominant note along with some herbal and floral aromas.

At first taste the hops really coat the tongue. There is a balance between citrusy West Coast hops and the herbal fruitiness of European noble hops, with some bitter resin at the end. The malt definitely takes a back seat to the hops. There are some lager notes here, but they are barely discernible. There is a slight sweetness that does pair well with the hoppiness. The mouthfeel is medium-heavy with clinging, syrupy hops. The finish has a complex balance of hops notes that linger with fading sweetness.

My overall impression of the Dogfish Head My Antonia is that it is fairly 1-dimensional. It would be nice if a bit more of the malt peeked through. This beer is a great display of hops, but it needs a little more Pils character from the malt. This is a good beer by anyone's standards, but we're all a bit spoiled by the folks from Dogfish Head. I was hoping for greatness and this falls a bit short for me.

The fruity citrus character of this beer makes it a natural pair for Madagascan chocolate. My choice was the Amano Madagascar and that worked well. Other good pairs would be the Michel Cluizel Mangaro Noir, the Patric Signature Blend, or for the real daring the Pralus Le 100%.