It’s never entirely possible to say how or why we ended up where we are in life – it’s a fool’s errand to try, most of the time – but there are certainly moments and people you can point to as having given you a nudge in the right direction. 

It’s fitting, then, that the first anniversary beer for Double Elbow is a collaboration with just one of those people, my friend Ashleigh. Bierstadt is famous for making fine lagerbier, but they should also be famous for keeping it relentlessly real at all costs. In my opinion, anyway. 

This Festbier is an homage to the beers consumed en masse each fall in Munich. Slightly darker and more malty than the ones you might find at Oktoberfest, it’s still lighter and easier to chug than Märzen, especially many domestic iterations of it. We used malts from Admiral Maltings in Alameda, CA, hops from Indie Hops in Oregon, and yeast from Escarpment Labs north of the border. We employed a single-decoction mash and an extra cold fermentation schedule to ensure it stayed as quaffable as possible, and we hope you enjoy.

Thanks for a fun first year, here’s to many more to come.