{"id":522,"date":"2016-09-07T22:39:20","date_gmt":"2016-09-08T02:39:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/?p=522"},"modified":"2016-09-07T22:50:30","modified_gmt":"2016-09-08T02:50:30","slug":"what-im-drinking-bells-oktoberfest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/2016\/09\/07\/what-im-drinking-bells-oktoberfest\/","title":{"rendered":"What I&#8217;m Drinking: Bell&#8217;s Oktoberfest"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.bellsbeer.com\/beer\/specialty\/octoberfest-beer\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-527\" src=\"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/BellsOctoberfest12ozBtl.jpg\" alt=\"Bell's Oktoberfest Label\" width=\"400\" height=\"400\" srcset=\"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/BellsOctoberfest12ozBtl.jpg 400w, https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/BellsOctoberfest12ozBtl-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/09\/BellsOctoberfest12ozBtl-300x300.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 400px) 100vw, 400px\" \/><\/a>It&#8217;s September so tonight I&#8217;m drinking Bell&#8217;s Oktoberfest.<\/p>\n<p>Oktoberfests are sometimes generalized as VMOs because of the overlap between the Vienna Lager, M\u00e4rzen, and Oktoberfest styles.<\/p>\n<p>Bell&#8217;s Oktoberfest is a great beer for when the evenings are getting colder, or in our case just as warm but rainy.<\/p>\n<p>The main thing you notice from an Oktoberfest should be the malt. I enjoy a caramel sweetness in the finish that stays with you, almost cloying, and when the color also evokes caramel. There are definitely dryer and lighter takes on the style too. Bell&#8217;s hits the malt notes I love.<\/p>\n<p>The malt should be balanced with noble hops. I couldn&#8217;t tell you what Bell&#8217;s is using, however I recently had <a href=\"http:\/\/dbbrewingcompany.com\/beers\/vienna-lager\/\">Devil&#8217;s Backbone&#8217;s Vienna Lager<\/a> and loved the taste of Saaz hops in the style. As a point of reference, Saaz is the signature hop taste of Bell&#8217;s Oberon.<\/p>\n<p>Another Oktoberfest I&#8217;ve loved, at the suggestion of my brother Charles, is <a href=\"http:\/\/www.merchantduvin.com\/brew-ayinger-oktober-fest-marzen.php\">Ayinger Oktober Fest-M\u00e4rzen<\/a>. That my be the best example of the style available. If you can find a bottle this fall I <strong>strongly<\/strong> recommend you pick one up. I also really enjoyed <a href=\"http:\/\/flyingdogbrewery.com\/?beers=dogtoberfest-marzen\">Flying Dog&#8217;s Dogtoberfest<\/a> although I haven&#8217;t seen it in Southeast Michigan in a few years.<\/p>\n<p>On the flip side is <a href=\"https:\/\/www.samueladams.com\/craft-beers\/octoberfest\">Sam Adams&#8217; Octoberfest<\/a>. It&#8217;s a super tasty beer! But it doesn&#8217;t have the toasty sweet malt or noble hops I&#8217;m looking for in an Oktoberfest. It might be because I have killed my taste buds and need more malt &amp; hops, but I look for more in an Oktoberfest.<\/p>\n<p>Are there any other VMOs I should check out?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s September so tonight I&#8217;m drinking Bell&#8217;s Oktoberfest. Oktoberfests are sometimes generalized as VMOs because of the overlap between the Vienna Lager, M\u00e4rzen, and Oktoberfest styles. Bell&#8217;s Oktoberfest is a great beer for when the evenings are getting colder, or in our case just as warm but rainy. The main thing you notice from an &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/2016\/09\/07\/what-im-drinking-bells-oktoberfest\/\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">What I&#8217;m Drinking: Bell&#8217;s Oktoberfest<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":533,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[60],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-522","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-beer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=522"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":531,"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/522\/revisions\/531"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/533"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=522"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=522"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/george.hotelling.net\/91percent\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=522"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}