Crooked Hammock’s Oktoberfest celebration

Crooked Hammock brewery kicked off its one year anniversary with its first Oktoberfest celebration Sunday. Manager, Matthew Frey, says it is hard to pinpoint the origin of Oktoberfest

“The Brewers have a different story then our chefs did,” said Frey. We kind of had a little dispute over here, our chefs say it goes back to 1820’s to like a big wedding ceremony. The Brewers say it goes back a lot further then that, to like the 16th century.”

And looking back to the 16th century, Crooked Hammocks head brewer Chris Wood says this was originally celebrated in Munich Germany

They all go to town square and there’s a big oak barrel and the mayor comes down he hits the bong on the big oak barrel and it’s full of beer,” said Wood. “Beer goes everywhere and people run up with their mugs to get the beer.”

Wood adds that in Munich they’re bound by the purity law which means they can only use the four main ingredients of beer; hops, yeast, water, and malt. Here, in America, they can add fruit, spices, and a number of other ingredients.

For our oktoberfest we did 3 beers,” Wood’s explains. “We did the dunk of ice, a Mars in style oktoberfest beer and a smoked pumpkin coffee brown ale.

To ensure the celebration was big, they even had a snapchat filter and they say next year will be even better.  For those interested in a little bit more culture, Oktoberfest is the worlds largest folk festival and for those traveling to Germany to see it first hand, they are spending a lot of money to do so.

Hostel prices hiked up from 16 to 80 euros per night and if folks were lucky enough to get an Airbnb those prices were significantly higher as well. Folks said they saw tents in campgrounds on Airbnb for up to eighty euros per night. So, it’s safe to say though – that Oktoberfest in Germany is a festival like no other.