A 3.8% beer is the kind you can order twice and still find your way home. Mischievous Mild, a British golden mild from My Local Brew Works, is pouring at A Man Full of Trouble, the Society Hill tavern at 127 Spruce Street, and a cask-conditioned version goes on tap Friday, October 30, for Mischief Night.
The cask version of Mischievous Mild is the one to plan around. Secondary fermentation happens in the cask, which gives the beer a deeper flavor and finer carbonation, and the date is a deliberate nod to the night before Halloween. Mild is an old British style built around malt, with the hops kept in the background, and a cask pour is how it is meant to be served.
What Is in Mischievous Mild
My Local Brew Works brewed the beer with local Deer Creek malts, East Kent Goldings hops and Liberty Bell Ale yeast. The result is delicate and malt-driven, with notes of fresh bread, honey and soft floral spice. At 3.8%, Mischievous Mild is built to be sessionable, the sort of beer that lets a long evening in an old room stay long.
The partners set out to honor the tavern’s colonial roots by modernizing a period recipe. My Local Brew Works calls A Man Full of Trouble Philadelphia’s only surviving colonial tavern, and says the beer pays tribute to its 18th-century namesake, “The Man Loaded with Mischief,” which operated illegally until 1773.
Where to Find Mischievous Mild
A Man Full of Trouble is a Society Hill bar and museum that reopened in 2022 as the Philadelphia tasting room for SUCCESSION Fermentory. The Chester County brewery makes farmhouse-style beers from clean, farmed and foraged ingredients sourced across Southeastern Pennsylvania. Mischievous Mild is the latest beer from My Local Brew Works’ newest partnership with the tavern.
My Local Brew Works is a nanobrewery in Frankford, inside the historic Globe Dye Works building. Wayne Humphrey and Tim Montague started homebrewing in a Philadelphia backyard in 2010, and the brewery now makes custom beers for bars, restaurants and events, with clients getting a hand in the brewing.
The name comes from the British habit of calling a favorite pub “my local,” an expression Montague picked up while earning his PhD in England. The brewery can also make several beers of different styles and strengths from one original mash, which is how a small operation keeps a long list of partners supplied.
Its collaborations run around the region. Birchrun Hills Farm in Chester County has beers brewed with the same grains the farm feeds its livestock. Monk’s Cafe pours the Jawnmower, a Belgian-style single, and Butcher Bar serves the Positively Philly Pale Ale. Bolo, the Latin American dining room and rum bar, has three house beers developed with Chef Yun Fuentes.
After Mischievous Mild, a Porter at the Powel House
The brewery has another historic recipe coming. My Local Brew Works brewed the Robert Hare Porter (6.5%), adapted from its original 18th-century recipe, for the Spirits of Independence series presented by the Philadelphia Society for the Preservation of Landmarks. Steven Grasse of Quaker City Mercantile gives a lecture on colonial porter, with a tasting, on Friday, November 20, at 6:30 p.m. at the Powel House, 244 S. 3rd Street.
Tickets are on Eventbrite, and the porter is a natural second stop for anyone who likes the idea of drinking history.
A cask on Mischief Night also fits neatly into the rest of the Halloween plans around the city, for anyone who wants a quiet pint between the parties.
Mischievous Mild asks for nothing but a stool and an evening, and a room this old has plenty of both.
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