Brewery- Braxon
Beer- Oktober Fuel
Style- Oktoberfest/Marzen
ABV- 5.8%
IBU- 20
Fall means football, tailgating, festivals, crisp air, and cool evenings. It also means good beer. Germany’s Oktoberfest begins in September and ends in early October. For years, many breweries have been making this traditional German lager to celebrate the occasion. Braxton is excited to introduce its first annual Oktoberfest Lager — Oktober Fuel.
This traditional fest style beer has a beautiful orange-ish, copper hue, complex malt aroma with a faint malt sweetness, and slight spicy hop characteristics of noble hops. It is malt forward with a touch of noble hop spice. It’s fuel for Fall.
If you’re going to put out an Oktoberfest beer in a city like Cincinnati, you’ve gotta know what you’re doing. There are a TON of great examples of the style, with most of our breweries doing their best to show that they respect the German heritage that made this city what it is today.
Braxton nailed it with this beer. They went as traditional as possible with a lager that nails the style using decoction brewing to create a beer that is layered in delicious, malty, bready flavors without letting the sweetness dominate the flavor profile.
The beer was first released in 2015, right after they announced their first lager, Twisted Bit (you can read more about that one here). The next fall it hit cans, and it’s been a staple of my Oktoberfest celebrating ever since!
My Thought’s On Braxton’s Oktober Fuel.
I have said before that this is one of my favorite examples of the style here in Cincinnati, and I mean it. This beer is great. In the glass it pours a really beautiful copper color with a thick bubbly tan head on top.
Aromas come to life with deep bread and floral notes. This beer smells like a fall afternoon, and it really begs to be paired up with the warm smells of roasted chicken and bratwurst as the sun is setting.
The beer has a great flavor, a near perfect balance between soft German spicy hops and a rich bready character that just touches on the sweetness that begs you to have another sip. The beer finds itself at home in the sunshine, in a liter mug frothing at the brim, or just as much in a snifter in a warm family room next to the fireplace.
Fantastic.