Beer is the lifeblood of Oktoberfest. Thousands of gallons of suds will be consumed over the course of the nine-day Bavarian festival. Raising a stein at a local festhalle isn’t the only way to get int the Oktoberfest spirit.
Ideally, these beers are paired best with pretzels, roast pork, German sausages and sauerkraut. An LCBO spokesperson recommended a few year-round German staples like Hacker Pschorr Munich Gold Lager, Ottakringer Hellesor or Spaten. Other brews like Hofbrau Oktoberfestbier and Paulaner Oktoberfest Wiesn Bier are brewed in honour of Oktoberfest. As with any of these brews, they're served best in a large stein.
There are plenty of Oktoberfest-themed and German beers available at your local LCBO. If you’re looking to host your own Bavarian festival or indulge in a German pint, here are some of the best beers to fill your stein during Oktoberfest.
Waterloo Brewing Festbier
The unofficial flagship beer of Kitchener-Waterloo Oktoberfest, Waterloo Brewing brought back their festbier for this special occasion The beer is amber in colour and malt-forward. It’s an easy-drinking lager that pairs especially well with a hot pretzel.
Erdinger Weissbier Dunkel
Something on the opposite end of the Oktoberfest spectrum, Erdinger Dunkel is on the darker side and has a more robust flavour than the typical Bavarian lagers. The roasted malts give a caramel-like sweetness and darkness to the beer, which is a nice change of pace from the traditional lagers on this list.
Erdinger’s Dunkel is brewed with both wheat and barley, but it takes on the character of a dark lager and you’d never know it was a wheat beer.
Silversmith Brewing The Bandit Smoked Oktoberfest Lager
Silversmith Brewing is based in Niagara-on-the-Lake and this is their unique take on an Oktoberfest lager. The beech-smoked malt provides an additional layer of depth and it’s a subtle, smokey, charcoal-like flavour on the beer.
With a caramel hue and a semi-opaque quality to it, the addition of smoke adds a level of character to this lager and gives it a much fuller body.
Gaffel Kolsch
The Kolsch-style beer is a hybrid of sorts between an ale and a lager and adopts qualities from both styles. A bit of a background on the Kolsch style;
it’s similar to champagne in that official “Kolsch”
is brewed within 50 kilometres of Köln, Germany.
Gaffel has a straw-yellow colour to it and it’s the most approachable beer of this lot. It’s very light and has a slight grassy note to it, but a clean finish. If you’ve never tried a Kolsch, Gaffel is an excellent place to start.
Paulaner Hefe-Weissbier
One of the sole wheat beers on this list, Paulaner’s weisbier displays the same qualities as a typical wheat beer. With a banana-like flavour profile, it’s very effervescent and semi-opaque in colour.
Hofbräu Oktoberfestbier
This beer is brewed specially for Oktoberfest in Germany and it encapsulates the Oktoberfest spirit. It’s a Marzen-style brew and there’s a semi-sweet finish and a slight corn note to it. True to the festbier form, it’s amber in colour and sits at 6.3 percent ABV.
Lokal Düsseldorf Altbier
At 4.5 percent ABV, this altbier is one of the lighter Oktoberfest-themed offerings at the LCBO. This altbier is produced by Old Tomorrow Brewing in Ottawa and pours to a copper-finish and has a caramel-like note to it. The Düsseldorf name is inspired by the city in West Germany.
Wellington Helles Lager
Brewed at nearby Wellington Brewery in Guelph, “Helles” translates as “pale in colour”. This is Wellington’s answer to the typical German light lager, but uses all-Canadian ingredients. It’s a very sessionable lager, best served in a tall lager glass.
