Allgäuer Festbier

Brewed by Allgäuer Brauhaus (Oetker Group)
Style: Oktoberfest/Märzen
Kempten, Germany

Bottle labeled as Allgauer Oktoberfest. Golden pour with a tall foamy white head. Nose is malt, grains, bread, soft honey, lemon, grass and creamed corn. Taste is bready malts, light yeast, soft lemon, honey, grassy hops and toast. Body is light-medium with a strong carbonation but not quite to fizzy status. Finishes with more creamed corn, semi-sweet malts, grassy hops, yeast, light lemon and toast. Not too bad.

500 mL bottle from Wine Warehouse under the Allgauer Oktoberfest label. Kind of a sickly looking golden amber pour with a minimal head. Very corny aroma with some grassy notes. Very bitter grassy taste with some caramel sweetness poking through. Very effervescent, medium bodied.

Bottle: Amber color, light head and lacing. Nose of faint malty grains and some light lagery esters like a russian malt liquor might possess. The flavor has a nice mouthfeel with some full caripils notes and some munichy type malts. Overall it feels a bit adjuncted and maybe a bit too sweet.

Boring golden color with a medium white head. Skunky, grass, yeast, malts, and corn. Medium body. Flavor of grass, yeast, malts, and herbal. Mild bitter finish. I’ll avoid this one from now on.

Bottle. Pours clear straw, corn and yeast aroma. Flavor is off, skunky,yeasty, some grass, and malt. Mouthfeel was very weak and a slight bitter finish. This was just a plain ol’ lager, nothing Oktoberfest about it...blah.

Pours a clear honey orange color with a white head, decent lacing and nice looking foamy bubbles. First impression of the nose is that it has a bit more corn and skunky yeast/old hops than expected, with a resemblance to pale lager that is hard to shake. It seems to lack any sort of “festive” smell, which is what I would characterize as fresh cut hay, light, dry hops, and maybe some mild squash. Doesn’t have much of that, instead it tastes like straightforward light malts and some wet and soggy corn. I assume that this is a fresh bottle, since it hasn’t been in the US for long (this season is the first, I think). But could this possibly be old stock that was pushed overseas?

Pale amber with a thin white head. Aroma had caramel, sweet malts and grain. Taste was coppery, that’s it. Some caramel and currant were there but very little. Palate was slightly thicker then water. This was weak.

Yuck, yuck, yuck. This was a pale lager / cheapo pilsner that tasted like some of a weak island beer from a third world country. I can’t believe this came from Germany or that I bought it without checking on it first. It slipped into my shopping cart a few weeks ago, when I was on a festbier run. Poured a cloudy murky yellow-orange color with an initial head that was ok. It was all downhill from there. Aroma was of semi skunked pilsner, spices absent. The flavor was grassy and skunky with a typical pilsner hoppiness to finish. Some caramel in there, but I didnt enjoy it one bit. What is so Oktoberish about this beer, the mere fact that it has more body than a pale lager? Trash.