Oktoberfest is Coming!
Oktoberfest is Coming!The degrees are just about to start ticking back down toward autumn. Be ready for Oktoberfest this year with your own Festbier!
Oktoberfest has been held annually in Munich since 1810. It’s the world’s largest beer festival. For most of its history, the rich, malty amber lager Märzen (pronounce mehrt’zen) was the beer of choice. But from the 1970s through the 1990s, Munich’s breweries shifted to a lighter, more drinkable style called Festbier (“festival beer”), now the beer actually served in the tents. It should pour pale gold to light amber, with a clean, bready malt aroma and gentle noble hop spice. On the palate, expect a smooth, medium-full body with grainy-sweet malt balanced by crisp, restrained bitterness. Clean and drinkable, built for celebrating one liter (or Maß) at a time.
If you don’t have temperature control to lager this beer, there’s an ale version down below 😉
Festbier! – Lager Version
Target stats:
- 5 gallons, ~6.0% ABV, ~22 IBU, pale gold, OG ~1.056, FG ~1.012
Grain bill:
- 9 lbs German Pilsner malt
- 3 lbs Munich malt (light)
- 0.5 lb Vienna malt (optional, adds a touch more depth)
- 0.25 lb Carahell or other light crystal malt (optional, rounds out body slightly)
Mash:
- Single infusion, 152°F for 60 minutes.
Hops:
- German noble hops — Hallertau, Tettnang, or Saaz all work
- 1 oz Hallertau Mittelfrüh @ 60 min (bittering)
- 0.5 oz Hallertau Mittelfrüh @ 15 min (flavor)
- 0.5 oz Hallertau Mittelfrüh @ 5 min (aroma)
Yeast:
- German lager yeast — Wyeast 2124 (Bohemian Lager), White Labs WLP830 (German Lager), or Fermentis SafLager W-34/70 (also Bohemian Lager).
Fermentation:
- Ferment at 48-52°F for about 2 weeks, or until gravity stabilizes.
- Diacetyl rest: raise to 65-68°F for 2-3 days near the end of fermentation to clean up any diacetyl (buttery off-flavor).
- Lager/cold-crash: drop to 33-38°F and hold for 3-4 weeks minimum (longer is better — 6-8 weeks is ideal if you have the patience and fridge space).
Water profile:
- Ca: 50-75, Mg: 5-15, SO4: 50-75, Cl: 50-75, Na: 0-25, HCO3: 50-100
Festbier – Ale Version (if you aren’t able to lager)
If you don’t have a chest freezer/fermentation chamber to hold true lager temps, Kveik is a good workaround that gets you close to Festbier character using ale-friendly fermentation temps. Lutra Kveik ferments clean with minimal esters even at warm ale temperatures. It’s bred to mimic lager character while fermenting at ale-friendly temps (as low as 55°F, even up to mid-70s in a pinch) and finishes fast (3-4 days for primary).
Same grain bill and hops as above work fine .. just swap the yeast and skip the extended cold-lagering process. You’ll still get a clean, crisp result much closer to lager character than a typical ale yeast would give you.
If you want to do your own recipe, we certainly have the grains and hops and yeast. .. the team is happy to help you with your recipe.
NTHBS also carries Märzen and Festbier extract kits!
Hope you have fun with this. Reply here and let us know how it turns out!
Prost!
-eric-
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