Ayinger follows that German naming convention, where the “er” signifies where it’s from. Ayinger beer is brewed in Aying, in this case by the Inselkammer family, who recently lost their senior boss, Franz Inselkammer. I hope, should you attend Snallygaster or not, you raise a glass of Ayinger Oktober Fest-Märzen in his honor.
I am always moved by the loss of life, refusing to let myself become so complacent in the violence of our modern world that one lost life won’t move me. But outside of my general hatred of violence, I am mourning the loss of my own senior boss, my father, Dr. Peter J. Stein. My dad would have turned 88 two days before Franz Inselkammer died at the age of 88. My father and Franz likely shared many things in common, and while to my knowledge they never met, they were both born onto an earth where a computer required punch cards, and almost nobody had one. They left the world this year with the ability to use the supercomputer in their pockets to video conference someone in Aying, Prague (where my dad was born), the United States and nearly every place around the world.
Despite all the changes in Inselkammer’s life (not considering all of the massive paradigm shifts from the 1930s to the 2020s) some things remained the same. For example, his Oktober Fest-Märzen is a beer that is brewed in March for release in the fall. If you look at Merchant du Vin’s website (Ayinger’s importer), you will find a method that I’d imagine goes back generations:
Märzen is brewed in March to be ready for the September and October beer festivals.
This beer has long been a harbinger of the fall for me, but it likely has meant a turn towards the autumnal for many generations more. And as the world said goodbye to Ayinger’s fifth master brewer, Franz Inselkammer, on September 20, 2024, Ayinger is now ushering in a new phase with their sixth brewer.
And so rather than focus on death, let us turn our attention to the celebratory nature of Ayinger’s beer. The color of Oktober Fest-Märzen is a pale copper. Certainly lighter than a penny but not far from the bright, brilliance you find with a shiny new 1-cent piece.
The aroma is of candied fruits, a bit of raisin with a peppery spiciness the way I remember a freshly-baked loaf of rye smelling. A faint grassy lemon gives way to cracked black pepper; certainly the aromatic stuff for which German hops are known and grown. A mild salt water taffy smell nips the nostrils before the lemon-pepper cedar-apricot aroma rips the olfactory off the boardwalk and onto the forest floor.
The taste is sweet up front and bready in the middle. Full bodied and certainly far from thin, but going from a Helles to this Oktober Fest-Märzen is a bit like having a spoonful of soft serve ice cream and then going into a dense dark chocolate scoop. While the beer can come across as heavy and hefty (if you’re coming from a light lager) it is so deserving of more that your tongue begs you to take another sip. Generally sweet up front and off-dry in the finish, the I perceive the beer’s approach as less dry, but the bitterness is there, reminding my tongue that this beer comes from one of the most modern breweries in Europe. The intended sweetness up front, and combination of dryness and bitterness in the finish make it infinitely drinkable.
If you get a chance to enjoy Ayinger Oktober Fest-Märzen, I would strongly encourage you to do so while raising a toast to your parents, grandparents, or even great grandparents. Raise a glass to the older folks in your past and may we find peace in our lives as they have now that they’ve joined the ancestors.
