German beers you can sample in Petaluma this Oktoberfest

For beer lovers, it may have been the saddest news of the summer: “Oktoberfest 2020 in Munich, Germany, will not take place due to the Corona Pandemic.” Those who have seen the thousands of revelers dancing on flimsy biergarten tabletops at the close of each day of the multi-week festival know that social distancing probably does not translate well during Europe’s biggest celebration of beer. This is not the first time Oktoberfest was cancelled, but with spikes in Bavarian coronavirus cases, a quieter festival season seemed inevitable.

While the official Oktoberfest was canned, last week Bavarians still tapped a smallish keg and yelled “O’zapft is!” (“It’s tapped!”, the official war cry to kick off the festivities) wearing lederhosen leather pants, dirndls and protective face coverings. This year, more than 50 beer halls in Bavaria raised a liter to toast “Prost!” with social distancing rules in place.

A number of the city’s hosts also turned to online tours and virtual events to celebrate Oktoberfest. And while the Meadow remained closed, Munich moved the famous Ferris wheel and other carnival rides to other locations throughout the city, where citizens still enjoyed the smell of roasted almonds, brats and rotisserie chickens.

This year’s official Oktoberfest dates run from Sept. 19 to Oct. 4 and in Petaluma, a few taprooms and restaurants are cheering up fans with German beer and food celebrations. See my article from last year on the history of Oktoberfest, as well as past local brouhahas as a good primer for your festivities, but definitely check social media pages for the most current info.

You may still be able to catch the tail end of Taps’ Oktoberfest, which runs Sep. 26 through Oct. 1 at 54 E. Washington. Here you can find some of the best German beers like Weihenstephaner, Andechser, Paulaner, Ayinger and Stiegl freshly tapped, and try out German-inspired cuisine like pretzels, sauerkraut, spätzle and brats on Taps’ special food menu.

Brewster’s Beer Garden (229 Water St. N.) moves Oktoberfest squarely into mid-October (Oct. 10-11) and will host outdoor live German music, festival hall food offerings and traditional taps like Weihenstephaner Hefeweissbier, and local Oktoberfest beer varieties like Sudwerks’ (Davis) award-winning Marzen.

If you prefer to sample lagers at home, head to HenHouse’s taproom to pick up 16-ounce cans of Fest Life, a wonderfully malty and bready festbier that has beautiful amber hues, and finishes with floral hops. Fest Life (4.5% alcohol by volume) tastes like a Helles mixed with a Marzen, two favorite German lagers. Find 4 packs at HenHouse Palace of Barrels (1333 N. McDowell).

While a low-alcohol, golden pilsner is the current trend in official Oktoberfest beer because of its “drinkability,” this time of year is a perfect opportunity to try traditional German draughts like hefeweizen (hazy wheat beer), dunkel (sweet and dark beer) and Helles (refreshingly carbonated, bitter pils) when you can find them.

A fellow beer connoisseur and Argus-Courier subscriber, John Donnelly and his wife Diane, pointed us to one of the best beer values in town: Trader Joe’s (169 N. McDowell) carries German export, Bitburger Premium Pils, in 16-ounce cans for a few dollars (4.8% alcohol by volume).

We also found Bitburger Festbier, a crisp, malty lager in 11.2-ounce bottles at Grocery Outlet (80 E. Washington) at a deep discount (6.2% alcohol by volume). Bitburger is from Bitburg, Germany and makes a great beer, but because the brewery is outside of Munich, it’s not one of the six sanctioned Oktoberfestbiers.

Only Hofbrau, Spaten, Lowenbrau, Augustiner, Hacker-Pschorr and Paulaner can officially call the beer they serve “Oktoberfestbier,” while other brewers usually use the terms Oktoberfest, Festbier, Marzen or Helles to describe these fall seasonal offerings. For post-celebration deals, the Grocery Outlet is one of our favorite places to scout out German beer exports like Hacker-Pshorr and Hofbrau.

As far as official Oktoberfestbiers, we came across fresh six-packs of Hofbrau Oktoberfestbier at Wilibees recently and what a pleasure is has been to enjoy a few bottles, poured into one of our official Oktoberfest steins (called “maskrug” or simply “mas”) safely in our own backyard.

As export beers are often exposed to heat during shipping and storage, age may have a significant impact on flavor. Petaluma brewers like HenHouse and Lagunitas make it easy to tell when beer is fresh by printing “brewed on” dates on cans and bottles of beer. For German exports, beer dates are somewhat enigmatic as many European bottlers use a Julian code to date beer freshness, or codes with letters and not-so-obvious numbers. For example, the Hofbrau Oktoberfestbier we recently purchased sported the code “L 188 T” which translates to a July 6, 2020 date. (The “T” represents 2020, as T is the 20th letter of the alphabet and the “188” represents that the beer was brewed on the 188th day of the year.)

Some brewers even notch the label on the bottle to mark the “best by” or “brewed on” date. With a little math and an internet search, beer fans should be able to find out if the beer was brewed or bottled in the last few months, which plays a key role in its freshness and enjoyability.

Though we had planned to venture to Munich this fall for Oktoberfest, we were satisfied to take home Sierra Nevada’s Oktoberfest bottles, an all-time favorite Marzen festbier with Vienna and Munich malts and old world hops, while we catch Netflix’s seasonal period drama “Oktoberfest: Beer & Blood.” Sierra’s Oktoberfest (6.0% alcohol by volume) is available at Wilibees, Charley’s and Petaluma Market.