An Oktoberfestbier 'style' question...

I think I was going through a similar situation as the OP, having tried Sam Adams, Victory, and Brooklyn in that order. None of them really appealed to me. I found the SA to be too sweet, the Victory to be too nutty or smokey or some flavor I didn't expect, and the Brooklyn too bland. Then I tried the Ayinger. I could drink liters of that stuff. I think I'm about done with the American versions.

 

I'll paraphrase right from Tehnology Brewing and Malting, which is the German brewing text book that I used while studying in Munich:

Maerzen os more of a stength category in Germany, in between vollbier (normal helles, export, dunkel) and bock, and has and extract of 13-14 degrees plato. Two color levels are commonly brewed, a golden version at 11-12EBC and a amber copper version at 40-42EBC. alcohol content is roughly 5.5-6% depending on attenuation level.

Festival beers are a separate category and are mostly pale with the rare darker example. Extract is typically 12-12.5 plato for most, but the Oktoberfest festival beers are brewed to the same extract at maerzen at 13.5-14 plato and have an accordingly higher alcohol content. These beers are brewed in the pale style.

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OK, so German brewers do consider festbier (festival beer) different than maerzen, which was the traditional beer at oktoberfest (which was actually a dunkel maerzen originally, then morphed into the copper version in the late 1800s or so). But, from the comparison of the two styles, you can see that pale maerzen and oktoberfestbier are essentially the same style these days. For some reason, American brewers got it in their heads that oktoberfestbier should be a copper maerzen and that's what they base their beers on for the most part. I personally tend to prefer the pale versions but some American brewers do good examples of the darker take on the style.

The brewery I work for brews a vienna lager for our oktoberfest celebration and as a fall seasonal so that's just more fuel to the fire that "oktoberfest" isn't really a style per se, but a group of similar beer styles (mostly maerzen and festbier) brewed for a special season/occasion, which range from pale to copper and are generally a bit stronger than the normal lager.

 

The history of the actual beer at Oktoberfest in that link seems fairly accurate to me. No?

 

Not when he's telling us it's a Helles being served these days (see Starkbier's comments above), but I've done my best to avoid the site since all the mistakes were exposed.

 

AlcahueteJ said: ↑

http://www.germanbeerinstitute.com/Oktoberfestbier.html​

Steve...I'm sure you're referring to the germanbeerinstitute site and not beeradvocate, right? ​

 

I'm wondering how much of that can be chalked up to writing something the wrong way. I think what he (maybe?) intended to say was that the amber colored Oktoberfestbiers were giving way to the helles Oktoberfestbiers, and not that Oktoberfestbiers were being replaced by Helles Lagerbiers. I've seen "helles" and "dunkel" used in Germany strictly to describe colors, and not styles, per se. I admit it doesn't read that way, but it could be a case of lost-in-translation.

 

That was my thought, too. Sometimes terms like helles, dunkel, export, etc. are styles and sometimes they're adjectives and descriptions. That doesn't doesn't mean there aren't other issues on that site, but he does get a few things right and seems to at least be familiar with most high-level terms.

 

Not really, I have one of his books on Helles where he also talks about it being at Oktoberfest. Ask Ron Pattinson about the author's discrepancies.

 

Aw c'mon, I quoted it in my reply!

 

Had a Weihenstephaner Oktoberfestbier a couple of days ago...was great!

 

Another long time fave, plus it's probably a better value overall.

You guys really do get the best Victory beers- I wish they would send some our way one of these days!

I finally got some Staghorn yesterday, and I can't wait to try it tonight. Just in time for some NFL action, too.

 

Living 10 minutes from victory, 15 from sly fox and 25 from stoudts has some perks, especially. If you're a lager lover like me

 

Of the German ones, the Ayinger is terrific. It has a little bit of that toasty and caramel'ish character but without being insanely sweet like some American ones. Still, there are American amber ones I truly love, too. I think Left Hand's is full-on amazing. I like Flying Dog's, too. Folks on the German forum speak highly of the one from Shiner, and it's quite the value, too. If there's a BJ's in your area, theirs is a multi-time GABF medal winner.
I used to enjoy the Paulaner one, but in recent years the hops and malt clash on my palate and come across almost like a plastic note. When fresh the one from Spaten is pretty amazing, although those green bottles can be disastrous in the wrong environment. On tap it's worth tracking down, though.

 

Those "new*" Spaten mixed 12-packs help to mitigate the green bottle malaise (somewhat).

*An aside to Steveh: I'm still seeing jumbled-up production codes all over town.

 

Your correct with the color statement. However I have done some reading on the history of Octoberfest and according to what I have read this is not entirely correct. The marzen brewed for the first octoberfest in 1810 was in fact dubbed wiesenmarzen as it had been brewed for the fest. The fest itself was started by king Ludwig to celebrate his marriage to Therese of Saxony on October the 12th. So Wiesenmarzen is in fact a style. A very very specific style.

 

Oh and personally as far as American styles go I love the Kaiser by Avery. Going to go down and buy some today.

 

Source or link? I'd like to read it.

 

http://www.amazon.com/World-Guide-Beer-Michael-Jackson/dp/0894712926
got the info from that book.
You can find information online, but its certainly not as detailed. I have been finding online is a really shabby and incomplete resource for beer history. Wikipedia is about the worse for incorrect information.

 

for German styles, I'm on that page across the board for many

 

Which is why I made sure to include that quote as such.

I just couldn't resist...