A new Sam Adams beer - Festbier

I will be extremely excited to try this one. As a fan of both festbiers and Oktoberfests, I think festbiers are a niche that has a lot of room to be explored by American craft brewers, especially during the warmer fall months when the actual Oktoberfest happens. Sam Adams Oktoberfest is fantastic and hope it is still brewed this year too, but optimistically hopeful about this festbier release and how it compares to some of the authentic German festbiers!

 

Very excited to check this one out!

 

Maybe, just maybe, there's a way to blend the two beers and come up with a true, to-style, Okto Marzen.
@FBarber -- how vocal can you go?

 

Well this means we could potentially get an amazing Fall/Oktober fest themed Variety Pack.

Boston Lager (Vienna Style)
Oktoberfest
Festbier
???

Recently variety packs have only been 4 beers, so I won't get my hopes up for the older 6 beer format. But imagine if the fourth is something like Noble Pils, Bavarian Lager or one of the older variety pack lagers. I'd be stacking cases. Although being realistic, it will probably be a hazy ale or Jack-O or something else trendy.

 

This could be very good if done right. Though I initially misread the IBU as 122 rather than 22 and freaked a bit...

 

Bonfire rauchbier would make me a very happy man. I remember buying a variety pack in the fall of 2011 and didn't know what to make of the rauchbier when I opened the first one. By the time the variety pack was through I was an enormous fan of it and it set me on a path of exploring as many rauchbiers as possible. I've always wanted to revisit it.

 

I'd be willing to give this one a try, though I'm not a huge fan of their Octoberfest as it's a bit sweet for my palate.

 

Will be trying this for sure. As for Octoberfest, will def. pick that up too. That beer is a classic.

 

Any idea when this one (the Oktoberfest) will ship/when it is supposed to be on store shelves nationally?

 

There's no updated info on either beer at the BBC website -- at least as of yesterday.

In years past our local distro always held the Sam Octo back until all the Sam Summer sold out -- but for some reason the Sam was one of the first Oktos I saw last year.

 

I have to imagine that Sam Adams Oktoberfest is among the best selling examples in the world. It's in nearly every American grocery/liquor store from coast to coast for 1/3 of the year. It's sweet for my tastes, but it's not an awful beer or anything. I'm still not usually a fan of pale Märzens. In spite of them being designed for mass consumption, my palate gets bored with them quickly. I can drink helles (or even Bavarian exports and such) all day, but festbier/pale Märzen is 1-and-done.

 

Huh. Just can't compute that interpretation. To me (better) Wiesn-style Festbiers have all the same qualities as a Helles, just amped up a little more. I wouldn't turn down an afternoon session with either.

In fact, I've spent a few afternoon sessions with both!

 

Well, there was this report posted by @Grounder yesterday:

 

Kinda ironic that I just got done criticizing them over in the other thread for not brewing enough traditional beer styles and then they went ahead and brewed a traditional beer style.

The beer gods are listening! Keep 'em coming!!

 

You'd think it would be like helles but better, but for me it accentuates the wrong things. At least for my tastes they come across as one-note and out-of-balance sweet. Not sticky like a bock (or candy stout and such), but sweet enough that there's no crispness on the back end. Instead of me wanting more, I want something lighter. For what it's worth, there are certain (stronger) exports that do the same thing and I don't love about 1/2 the maibocks I've had, too. I think it's just stronger pale lager styles are hit and miss for me. I can put down amber Märzen and darker bocks by the liter, though.

 

^This, although the draft versions vary from year to year. 2 years ago was pretty decent, downed more than a fair amount. OTOH, last year's version I tried a sampler and had it immediately drain poured as way too sweet.