No, we're not. This is gonna be a little different this year. Excellent. So you're gonna get a little viewing into what my Oktoberfeast celebrations are like. I don't just drink Oktoberfeast beer. I bring all these weird things out of the cabinet. Considering you're like shaking up Sherry and cocktail mixers at pool parties at your house, this is probably gonna get kind of strange. We didn't even introduce ourselves. Oh, we didn't even do it. Hey, I'm Pat. I'm an insufferable know-it-all at Binny's. Roger, beer. Yet, we suffer you. Weekly. Roger's pirate ringtone just came on. Ahoy, matey. I'm Chris. Arr, it's Roger. Yeah, Rod. Kevin Roger here. They do seltzer, hard tea, kombucha and beer when I'm lucky. I'm Alicia. I do wine and have to share an office with the insufferable pet. This edition, I made an effort to cocktail-wise make really simple drinks. These are Brophy approved. Nice. These are like two ingredient cocktails. Did you bring the traditional roast chicken? I did not. I'm leaving. That's the only thing that normally I would be to the nines with food. We'd have bratwurst, we'd have the bratwurst would be the most pedestrian of the fair. We'd have the nockwurst, the weisswurst, the bockwurst, all the worst. You know Chris is about to pan out his zoom camera, and he's going to have a spit, a barbecue spit next to him in this office where he's just slowly rotissering chickens. Is rotissering a verb now? You know that's about to happen, and he raised the chickens himself first and slaughtered them this morning. It's just like you're talking to a man that makes his own Clamado now. I'll have you pluck the chickens though. Happy to. Chris and I have no joke, had discussions about sourcing the proper cut for schweinhachs, the roasted pork knuckle, which is pretty difficult to come by. I've literally gone to butcher shops and been given the wrong part of the pig leg. Made do, happily accident, made some great pork shank, but it wasn't true schweinhachs. Sounds like a good excuse to go to Reams, then visit my house afterwards. So, Oktoberfeast, the Adamson family, Oktoberfeast. Exactly, well put. What should we have, so what should we try first? So, you're promising us more than the usual old Märzen and Fest beer, and we're gonna get the standard explanation between the difference of the two, I'm sure. That's correct. Worth repeating every year. Now, I actually had a Märzen beer last night for the first time. I was at the Solemn Oaths Tap Room over in Logan Square, and the air conditioning was absolutely freezing, so I was actually in the mood to drink a malty ass lager instead of a Luke Kolsch for once. It's crucial right now. There's a dehumidifier, if nothing else. Yeah. Just for the review, for those who are unfamiliar, most people when they think of an Oktoberfeast beer, they're going to think of something that's amber in color, probably dark amber in color. A little bit of sweetness to it, especially if it's an American-made one. Let's start with the type of beer that you would actually be served at Oktoberfeast in Munich. Obviously, the celebration this year postponed yet again, unfortunately, so that just means you need to Oktoberfeast your face off at home. You can do that with several of the official Munich breweries that offer and are allowed to sell beer at that Oktoberfest. One of them is Hofbrauhaus. The first beer that we're going to be drinking here is the Hofbrauhaus Oktoberfeast beer. This is brewed in the new modern German Festbier style, which started in the 1990s. The best way to think of this is like a German Munich Helleslager, but with a little more kick. Yeah, they're a little stronger. This one's 6.3% alcohol. I would say they're a little bit malty or too, not quite as dry and floral and spicy as a hell's can be. I mean, it's just, it's the closest thing for sure, but it's just besides being stronger in strength, I think it's a little stronger in character and body as well. Yeah. What's interesting with this one, I was looking at the Hofbrauhaus website and as far as the Hopp Bill and the Malt Bill, they are identical. I mean, they might change the Malt Bill a little, obviously, to get the higher alcohol, but I think you're right. It's definitely when you drink this, you can tell that it's a stronger beer. Again, it's funny, part of the reason that they conceived this Festbier style was that people are typically drinking these beers by the leader. They were getting pretty hammered or getting so full that they didn't really want to drink, keep drinking incessantly. At 6.3, I would say that the Hofbrau one is a little higher. I mean, that's basically what the Märzens usually clock in at. That's the usual Märzens drink. That is pretty strong. I think it may be a little bit lighter in body as far as getting full, but it's certainly not any weaker in alcohol content. Right. Yeah, give it a try, guys. It is a pretty, just beautiful, gorgeous beer. As we've said before, we're always trying to support this newfound interest in lagers, hashtag beer-flavored beer, hashtag beer for grownups. Take that nerds. It's this beautifully clear, as Broph said. It's got a really nice creamy mouthfeel to it. For everybody that still wants creaminess in their beer, there still is a little bit because of the delicate carbonation. I do really like the mouthfeel to this, but it's got a good amount of hops on the back end. Part of the reason I picked this one is... Yeah, totally. It's pretty dry. It keeps, yeah, it dries out the finish enough. Yeah, that's one thing I would say maybe separates it a little bit even more than Hellas, is that there's definitely a slightly more pronounced hop presence in the nose and on the palate. We use the term dangerously drinkable a little too often, I think, but this is one that I could see catching up with me if I'm pounding liters of it. I'm going to be one of those bodies passed out on that lawn behind the tent. Let the large guys just throw you on when you drink too much at Oktoberfeast. That was your experience of the one year you went, right? The waitresses carrying all those giant liter glasses are going to pass out before you do. I heard a rumor that some of the tents have NA beer there, and if you're getting too unruly, they'll just switch your beer to NA and not tell you. That's awesome. I don't know if that's legit or not. I hope they do. I like to hope it is. More bars should just have that as practice. Let's do a side by side here. I'm going to pass around the next one. We're going to try just so you can taste this side by side. This is Three Floyd's Munsterfest, which is a German style marten. The people over at Three Floyd's have been long-term German beer fans, especially German lager fans, and Munsterfest is something that they've brewed since way back in the day. They brought it back. It's in six packs now instead of Bombers, which is nice. All German barley and German noble hops go into this. 6.2% alcohol, 20 IBUs, so pretty much on par alcohol-wise and IBU-wise as the last one, but unfortunately you, the viewer, can't see this, but as we look at this, very different in color here. Stark difference, yeah. Still very clear though. Some people's Märzens are not this crystal clear, but very light tan head, but yeah, bright copper in color, flavor-wise very different, so toffee, caramel. Oftentimes when I'm having a Märzen, it's notably heavy and caramelized, and this has that toffee character like you talked about, but it's really just light and crisp though. Yeah, I think that the finish on it is really lifted and doesn't, again, sometimes I approach these beers like, well, I'll have one and no way I can go past that, but yeah, it is really bright and really fresh. This is one of the more drinkable, poundable, martsens I've had in a while. I mean, it enters the mouth with a sweet, caramely maltiness, but by the time you're swallowing, it's very clean tasting and there's a little bit of hot presence on the finish. Yeah. It's eminently drinkable for sure. Great job, Flasay. It still has that sweet almost, this one reminds me a little bit of like caramel corn or something. Right. I could see that. One of the reasons I wanted to offer this one and highlight it is that some people, I think, get a little shy away from the style when they try American-made Oktoberfeast that are Märzens because they can get pretty sweet. Even a classic like Sam Adams' Oktoberfeast, which is by far their most beloved beer and probably one of the most recognized Oktoberfeast. If you've had Oktoberfest in the past and you thought they're a little too sweet or they're too heavy for you, there's a lot of options on the shelves today and try some Festbiers. Hofbraus is excellent. Feinstefaner's is really nice. But then also there's some Märzens like this, one from Munster that Floyd's did a nice job making it not overly sweet or too heavy. Yeah, great job. Totally agree. What balance in this beer, especially from a brewery that's piling on hops pretty frequently. They are very restrained in that respect. In fact, in every respect, it's not overly sweet, it's not too malty, and it's not too hoppy. It's pretty nice. Yeah, great beer. Can we talk about the food that would be served at the Adams and Oktoberfeast with these two different styles? This would pair well with pretty much anything that's coming off the grill. Whatever sausages you like, brats, of course, being pretty popular, but if you're doing something garlicky like a knockwurst, or you're doing something that's smoked like a thuringer, that would work. This would be great with smoked pork chops. Hoffbrau recommends this pairs well with their spit roasted chicken. So if you're grilling chicken yourself, with the pieces, spatchcocking them, whatever you're doing, this works great with that. If we're going for some of the heartier fare, marytons can hang in there with things like sauerbraten, wiener schnitzel, things with richer gravies and stuff. I love richer gravies. Oktoberfeast beer is pretty perfect. Don't forget that schwein-hoxin and schwein-braten, Roger. Yes. Generally, what I'm hearing is fattier animal proteins with a caramelized maillard thing going on is going to be great with these Märzens and Festbeers. Yes, for sure. Also gravy. And also nice with sour, you have throwing sauerkraut or sour cabbage in there to have a foil to the sweetness, both in the food and the beer. Yeah, cuts through it a bit. And of course, it works with a pretzel. Yep. I haven't made homemade pretzels in so long. It's such a pain. Because I get the lye out and I put the goggles on. You put goggles on? Roger cooks meth while making pretzels. Yeah, man. It's like Roger's edition of Breaking Bad. Lye is food-safe poison. So yeah, you don't want to get it in your mucous membranes. You got to protect those mucous membranes. For the not-so-daring, you can use another basic thing, such as baking soda. It won't give you the same deep brown, crusty results, but it'll get you partway there. And you don't have to worry about the goggles. Does this look like a guy who's not interested in deep brown, crusty results? No. I mean, we were talking in my yard reaction, that Caramel-y beer with a deeply brown pretzel. I mean, how could that be wrong? Yep. True. True story. Brown chicken skin. Amen. So, the wine course is usually me walking up to Chris and going, hey Chris, I need a Riesling for Oktoberfeast. What should I get? So, this is actually, you're literally getting a taste of what I experience each year. So, Chris has picked out a couple of wines, or a throuple of wines for us. It's a throuple. If you guys don't mind, we might start with a red and build from there. And we're going to do August Kessler's, the daily August Spezbergunder or Pinot Noir, which Kessler is a fantastic Pinot Noir producer, based in Rudersheim and Ossmannhausen in the Rheingau. This is his kind of entry-level Pinot Noir. I think it's a remarkable buy for $20. I mean, try putting this up against domestic Pinots at $20 or even Burgundy. And this has a lot going on. This seems awfully like dense and dark for a Pinot Noir on the nose, like it's really blueberry forward. So this part of the Rheingau has some southwest-facing slopes, and gets a lot of sun and really steep slopes too, 45-degree angles. Wow, how do they harvest that? Is that all harvested by hand, then? I mean... Yeah, yeah. Pretty much in a lot of the Rheingau and the Mosel, you have no choice. We're going to try a Riesling later where the slopes are closer to like 65% grade. It's crazy, yeah. Yeah, the Pinot gets particularly ripe. It's definitely full-bodied. And he does several tiers of Pinot Noir, some of which are quite expensive and are really quite amazing. But I think for an entry level, this is pretty killer. This is an awesome wine. And it's 20 bucks? Yeah, 20 bucks. Compare this on the world stage at that price. It's doing pretty well. And this would be perfect, again, with that roast chicken or roast duck or even pork. Any of those things are going to be fantastic with this Speitzberg under. Obviously, this isn't the only Pinot Noir from Germany. I didn't realize that was such a big tradition, though. I mean, everybody knows the Riesling and all that. And I know they grew in vintage Pinot there, but I didn't know it was such a thing. Yeah. You'd be surprised at how much Pinot is actually produced in Germany. There are several really excellent producers. I think they're gaining popularity on the world stage, just because I think one thing, you want a cool climate for Pinot, and the Rhine is definitely very cool. But they've had a lot of warm vintages lately, which is maybe contributing to the muscular style you see here. I mean, it's loaded with fruit, but the tannins are still super silky. Yeah. For those that may have had German Pinot Noir five, seven years ago, and like, I've heard this spiel from wine people before about wanting to try German Pinot. It really has, I think, changed recently in terms of at least what we're getting in the market. Also, as Chris said, with these warmer vintages, they are growing and making really high-quality Pinot Noir. I'll have to look up the stat, but to Chris's point, they produce a lot of it and it's a surprising number of hectares that are devoted to Pinot Noir. Kessler, again, an awesome producer. He's a member of the VDP, quality-minded, membership-based organization of producers across Germany. For $20, this is going to be most coming out of the Willamette, California, even your Bourgogne regional stuff, due to the concentration of fruit and long finish. Just a quick shout out to the Rheingau. This is a very prestigious region. If you are shopping the German isle, and there's something you haven't had, you're comparing bottles. If something's from the Rheingau, chances are, it's pretty high quality. I would go with that, just off the face of it, say, over, we're going to go to the Rheinhessen a little bit, and much larger flatter area, not as prestigious. If you don't want to drink Pinot Noir, Chris, you picked up two whites for us. You want to introduce the next wine? Let's go to the Rheesling. What we have here is Dr. Tanish, Bernkastler Badstube. What? Yeah. Dr. Tanish, very famous producer in the Mosel River Valley. This is Middle Mosel, so we're moving from Rheingau, where the Pinot was, to the Middle Mosel. This is where there are a bunch of very, very famous villages for growing Rheesling. Yes, as opposed to the Upper Mosel or Lower Mosel. Yeah, high concentration of wine producers in the middle. Oh, this is sulfuric as hell. And as soon as you think Mosel, to Chris's earlier point, you should be thinking about these really steep vineyards up to kind of 65 degree gradient here. And unfortunately, the labor is so intensive that they kind of struggle to sell a lot of this wine at the price points it needs to be at to make this viable. You know, we're getting this wine that is, how much, Chris? This is right around 22 maybe, 22 bucks. For grapes that are hand picked on a steep slope of the Mosel. That doesn't seem that bad. 22 bucks? Oh yeah, very accessible, but unfortunately, some vineyards are being abandoned because it's not economically viable because of the labor costs. Well, you know, those practical Germans. So yeah, this is the village of Burn Castle, so in the middle Mosel and the neighbors are places like Vellin and Groch, very famous growing villages. This is right on the river. Literally, you have the river bank, a street, and then some buildings, and then right behind those buildings are just these incredibly steep vineyards. And the Bad Stuba Vineyard is very large and very famous. It contains within it several famous subplots, including Burn Castle or Doctor, which is very, very famous. So would you say for the wine, we're getting deep in the weeds here. For wine, more wine novices here like myself, Riesling people are always curious about the sweetness level. So if they've had maybe some inexpensive Rieslings, they've been treated to some sucavasa or sugar water. So explain just briefly the level of sweetness and- Oh, even I know this. As far as what we're drinking right now, where would you put this in the spectrum? Well, one thing I would say is if you've tasted it, and I know you have, you'll notice how zippy the acidity is. There is definitely some peachy nectarine sweetness up front. Oh, yeah. This is what's called a Cabinet. So this is picked early. Cabinet is the lowest sweetness level of the German Rieslings, right? Yeah, of the Pradeckach category. There are wines that are outside of that program. And what you have to remember is any of these predicates that are put on the bottle are about ripeness of the grapes. Measuring sugar at harvest. So, Cabinet is picked early, and then there's Spatlese, which is literally late picked, and then Auschlese, and then you go on into, frankly, sweet dessert wines from there, like Trockenbeerenauschlese, and Baron Auschlese, things like that. So, this is picked at a low level of sugar, and then the fermentation is halted when there's still some residual sugar. How strong is this, then? This is eight and a half percent alcohol. So, yeah, very low alcohol. I drink beers stronger than that. Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. We're passing on Roger's opportunity for the sixth podcast in a row to mention that people are looking to lower alcohol consumption these days. No, I was just going to say that I drink some beers higher than that. Yeah, for sure. Doppelbocks are stronger than that. That's interesting. Interesting. It's a refreshing wine. I like it a lot. So this is a very low alcohol wine. And what makes this happen is low levels of sugar at picking and then leaving some residual sugar behind. And one way you can tell within any of these ripeness categories, you cannot think that these categories translate directly to sweetness, Roger. Okay. It's all about sugar in the must at picking. Got it. If you look at the relative Prada cat level and alcohol level, you can tell about how sweet or dry your Riesling is going to be. So the higher the alcohol level in a cabinet, and you're going to max out maybe at 11 percent, it's going to be drier. But if it's really low, like seven and a half percent, it's going to be about as sweet as a cabinet's going to get. Got it. Generally speaking. But then it's complicated by the fact that levels of acidity also come into whether you're going to perceive all that sweetness or not. So it's all about acid-sugar balance, really. So it's a very complicated question. It speaks to Pat's point that the acid in this wine and really all Rieslings from Germany, frankly, are extremely elevated and make this sweetness much less perceptible, much less glowing, really fresh style. To Chris's point, just to kind of take complex German wine law and just keep it a little bit simple here. Cabinette actually can technically be dry and so it's not even a guarantee. So check the alcohol. If it is some degree lower here than 11 percent, you're going to get kind of an off-dry wine and you can assume that the ripeness, the weight, the texture, the fruit profile and oftentimes, the sugar levels will increase from Cabinette to Spatlesa to Yeah, that's the main thing you should take away is really, it's about the weight of the wine, the richness of the wine. If you move from Cabinette up to Auslesa, even if they're fermented totally dry, so no sweetness at all, you're going to notice a richness, a weight as the must weight goes up. I got like a huge blast of sulfur from this wine, like just totally huge. It blew off as it sits in the glass, but every time I swirl it more, it really comes back up to the surface. Is that just our bottle, or is that a signature of the style, or I mean- So very typical of German Riesling. Honestly, this is a Cabinette, a delicate light style, but it'll age 20 years without any problem, number one. Really? Oh, yeah. Riesling has an insane ability to age gracefully. It's beautiful. This wine is so young right now, it's almost ridiculous. Yet, aside from that little bit of sulfur in the nose, it is absolutely delicious. Oh, it tastes so good. It's just the sulfur in the nose is really throwing me for a loop. What happens sometimes, and certain producers are very famous for this, is like JJ. Prume, one of the greatest Riesling producers on the planet, is well known to have very reductive qualities when the wines are young, and that's what you're seeing here too. It's not bottling sulfur or any sulfur addition. It's actually hydrogen sulfide that is produced during a very slow and nutrient poor ferment, natural fermentation, and it will go away as long as it doesn't fix into a mere captain. Okay, so if you're aging these bottles in your cellars at home, that quality gradually fades? It does, yeah. Okay, cool. All right, well that was great. And one thing that really enhances it lately is the penchant for, in my opinion, for Germans to use screw caps, it seems slower to fade when they're sealed pretty tightly. I was going to mention that in the expected practicality here, we have three German wines all with screw caps. Yeah, definitely German engineering and practicality. Yeah, and most are using really high-quality screw caps, so they are mimicking the oxygen transfer that they desire so that they can age. And that was the criticism of screw caps early on, that you couldn't really age under them because there was no oxygen transfer. But that's all changed now, so trust the hardy screw cap. It's a nice closure. I have no qualms about laying down a screw cap recently for literally for decades. And I do. I think, too, some of that kind of, you know, burnt match, that reductive note is also woven into that kind of mineral petrol slaty kind of quality to the wine. So there's that at play as well. But then all fruit on the palate, it really is quite gorgeous. Yeah, I totally agree. I think for a long time, hydrogen sulfide might have been chalked up to terroir, you know, that mysterious mineral quality that people talk about because, you know, this is grown on blue slate soils. You know, a lot of German wines are grown on slate. And people like to think that that translates to a slaty aroma or flavor in the wine. It's really generally those things are sulfur compounds, rather than nutrients that have been absorbed from the ground. So next, we're going to do a Gewehrtsterminer. So this is Machmer, in a Machmer Gewehrtsterminer, 2017. And this is Spatleser. Pick later. Gewehrtsterminers have the cabinet Spatleser, Ausleser thing too? In Germany. Oh, okay. Yeah, and you know, we don't see too many Gewehrtsterminers on the shelf from Germany. Yeah, they're all from Washington, right? And Oregon. Well, Alsace kind of first comes to mind, but then, yes, we do have some new world attempts at them too. Oh, get your poorly made crap out of here. Get it out of Alicia's face. Yeah, right across the border in France, in Alsace is kind of the ground zero, the epicenter of really super fine Gewehrtsterminer. But it is grown in Germany and Northern Italy from whence it comes. Wow, this is totally different. Yeah, and with the Gewehrtsterminer, you really have to leave the grape on the vine quite long for it to develop all of that aromatic intensity. So spicy. And spice, and really kind of luscious stone fruit as well. And so they're doing that. This is spate lasa, so you can kind of, you know, we're looking for more weight, more ripeness here compared to the Riesling. Now, you know, we're dealing with two different grape varieties, so it's kind of apples to oranges. But you should find that kind of oily, richer texture for sure. This is awesome. Yeah, this wine is awesome. Think about the relative acidity too. I mean, Gewehrtsterminer is a relatively low or moderate acid grape compared to Riesling's very high acidity. And it's also an incredibly aromatic grape full of terpenes, like geranyl and things like that. Terpenes means floral. Terpenes, man, yeah. The stone fruit quality is on this is outrageous. There's like apricot, apple. This is perfect for Oktoberfeast because of that prominent apple flavor that I'm getting in this. But in like a really high quality like wine sap kind of variety apple, not like just a sour or like a plain jane apple. Like this is amazing. You know, Chris, I actually have not had this wine before. And when you sent over the list and I saw I was at $12.99 Geverts from- $12.99. From the- Wow, this is 13 bucks? From the Rheinhessen. I'm like, Jack, holy cow. How strong is this? 11 percent. Wow. That's Roger strength right there. And Roger price. Pretty mind blowing. This is a pretty good producer in the Rheinhessen. They're all organic. And like I said, Rheinhessen is not maybe a major prestige area, although there's some- a handful of really excellent producers there. But this is really a remarkable example of Geverts for $12.99. I don't even like sausage, but if I could have this with a sausage. Yeah, right. And it's just not my first go-to. But anyway, all the different sauces and condiments that you would then accompany that sausage with and some would be fruit-based, right? Yeah, for sure. This would be amazing. Well, check this out. How about curry-versed with this? Oh, yeah. Yeah. Anything with that kind of exotic spice that you can go out to from the wine. So shout out to Worst Kitchen, who makes a Christmas bratwurst, which sometimes is available not around Christmas, and that has sweet baking spices and golden sultanas in it. Nice. Raisins. So this would be great with that. Those sultanas will dovetail with this perfectly. I'm assuming they're pumping up the nutmeg in that too, which would be great. Bumping fat rails of it. Yes. Got to have nutmeg in my bratwurst. If you're just making roast pork, like it's super common in the fall, even if you're not thinking about Oktoberfeast, to make things with like apples and cranberries, and I think this would be perfect with that. If you find yourself not liking the enamel stripping acidity of a lot of white wines, this is definitely something to check out because of its more moderate acidity. This wine is awesome. Thanks, Chris. Great job with these wines. That's freaking out by the way. Yeah. This is an awesome wine, man. I'm really excited about this. It is so affordable. Yeah. We've covered a couple of basic beers, we've covered these wines, I guess it's time to do some cocktails and spirits, right Roger? Indeed. All right, what's up next? So the first thing that we're gonna do here is a beer cocktail that I actually mentioned on another podcast. It won't be the exact same rendition of what I made last time. We're big proponents here of Fever Trees products. They make really nice tonic waters, sparkling waters. They now make a cola. So when I saw this, I felt I need to try this immediately. So we're using the Fever Tree Distillers Cola as the base of this Radler. So Shandy's obviously have taken the world by storm, but the German... Gross, what are you making us drink? The German equivalent would be a Radler. And this drink is known in Germany as a diesel, because it looks like diesel fuel in the glass. It is Cola and Dunkleweizen. I'm not trying this. Get out of here. We're drinking Cola. Cola and Dunkleweizen, so dark wheat beer, dark half of Weizen. Pat, at least you have one of the world's great Dunkleweizens, the Einger Erweizen. Yeah, I mean, yeah, just hand me the bottle of the Einger Erweizen. That's a really big head. Einger Erweizen, great Dunkleweizen, one that's not quite as dark as some of them. Weisbeers famously are spicy, so the spice is going to be sweet baking spice, predominantly clove. You look at Cola, and Colas famously have these similar spices in them. They dovetail in perfectly with one another. It cuts the alcohol down, makes it low alcohol. You're going to be surprised, Pat. You're going to like this. It smells like a spice cabinet. So Roger, guide me here. Is there ice or no ice? No ice. Which do you pour first, and is it 50-50? Very good. Holy s***, Roger. No ice, 50-50, start with the Cola. This is just all cinnamon, nutmeg, clove. This is a spice cabinet, just liquefied. If you like Dr. Pepper. Screw you for making this taste good. Yeah. Now, we are using Fever Tree's new Cola, which if you've shopped at Binny's anytime in the past year, it's gradually becoming Fever Tree Beverage Depot. But I have not tried this new Cola yet. It's much drier than say Coke or Pepsi, and lighter in body, but it does have plenty of brown spice character. Plenty of sweetness, but it's not cloying though. Right. No, I think it's much drier than typical soda. They call it Distiller's Cola and says, crafted for whiskeys and rums of the finest distilleries. I think the sugar content is a little reduced, knowing that you're going to be putting a little sugar in there if you add spirits, especially a lot of rums. I'm not sure how I feel about this. What does? I like this. There's no business being delicious. Yeah, I was really skeptical going in. Really dynamic spice component of it. It's super interesting, very holidayish. How about like think banana bread when you try this? Yeah. Because famously, vice beers have a banana note to them. Your banana breads are going to have sweet baking spices in them, fruitcakes, like the true fruitcakes that Chris and I like, the English style. God. Don't you dare go on a fruitcake tangent right now. It's got some very serious- Alicia's got a meeting she's got to get to when we're done here. I could have this with banana bread in the morning before I got to- Perfect AM beverage. Perfect beer to disguise on your breath before going to work. Yes. Just say you got some really sugary thing from Starbucks and like a spice chai latte or something. That's what it smells like. It's a chai latte from Starbucks. Wow. Half of Weissen is often an AM beer in Germany too. Pair it with some morning sausage, Weisswurst. Weisswurst, Bockwurst. They eat sausage all day. Oh yeah. There's a sausage for every time. But Weisswurst is your morning choice. It's a very delicate, creamy, soft, white, almost like pudding consistency sausage. Indeed. I haven't taken part in too many of Roger's cocktail podcasts, but the ones I have, we normally have to break for 15 minutes while you assembled the drinks. But this, you did in about 35 seconds. So especially as you're thinking about hosting groups for Oktoberfeast or you're outside with a bunch of people, whatever. Yeah, this is a Pat Brophy cocktail, for sure. Doesn't get any easier. Do you think you can manage this, Pat? This isn't a cocktail. There's no ice in it. Before we put this one to bed, I want you to try the beer on its own. That way you'll get a sense of the difference between drinking it with the cola or not. This is a very light Dunkle Weiss. But still quite hazy, right? Oh, yeah. Well, Weiss beer, yeah. The original haze. Loaded with all kinds of loose proteins. The real haze, Roger. But yeah, when you drink this, it's obviously much drier. The banana is the predominant, I would say, flavor. There's a little bit of clove, but it's not super spicy. It's dry on the finish actually. But I think it's quite dry. The cola makes it pop. It's crazy. Yeah. What's this next thing you're making here, Roger? Roger's really giving that sack the business right now. All right. So, this is another one that I've mentioned in the past, but I wanted everyone to actually try it because I was lambasted for it. Well, I am about most things, but this is one of my favorite. So, can we call it the Eeyore? Shut up. This, okay. So, tying it back to when you asked before, has anyone been a white fence farm? I can attest that when all the executives from Jägermeister came to the US back in 2000, what was this, nine or 10 maybe, when they visited our store, we made sure to have a next to the display of Jägermeister was a lovely stack of root beer. Because one of the most common ways to enjoy Jägermeister in Germany is to mix it with root beer. So, you can't taste it? And when you think about it, they have so many, there's so many common ingredients in the two of them, I'd be willing to bet that they don't divulge what's in Jägermeister, it's all proprietary. Probably everything that's in root beer is in Jägermeister. It's 56 herbs, isn't it? This just tastes like root beer. Yeah, smells like root beer. It smells a little bit cinnamony like Jägermeister. I tasted the root beer on its own because I've never had this one. And for some reason, we have an Australian root beer, which is quite interesting. Yeah, because Roger really loves these Australian guys. So I really like their stuff. Also, it was because they didn't have any Sprecher, which is one of my go tos or Filbert's. Sprecher is a good root beer. Sprecher and Filbert's, I think, are two of the root beers you need to get to know if you don't already. I had never had Boenderberg until last night. I drink their ginger beer all the time, though. They do make good ginger beer. What attracted me to this, and I thought you might get a kick out of Pat in particular, was that the reviews that I normally got were, it's too spicy. What? People think Boenderberg is very dry, and I think what they pick up the most is that it has licorice root in it. It's pretty licorice-y, and that obviously can be a divisive flavor. Ginger root, sarsaparilla root, licorice root. Oh, it's licorice root extract. I think one of the prominent things in the nose of Jägermeister is licorice, so. Oh, yeah, for sure. Of course, yeah. Roger, the bottle of root beer here says invert bottle before opening. Did you do that? I did. Okay, good, good. I just want to make sure that our Jäger in root beer wasn't screwed up in any way. I mean, the root beer is relatively dry on the scale of American root beers, for sure. But I think the Jäger just like makes it explode with herbalness. Oh, yeah, that is a dry root beer. The Jäger adds a lot of sugar to it. Yeah. So now it tastes like Americanized root beers with the sweetness level. Yeah. I thought you'd think it was neat how well the flavors just melt and almost disappear. This is two in a row garbage can cocktails that totally taste good in work, Roger. So big ups to you. So the final cocktail here is just something that is very fall appropriate. So it could be great for Oktoberfeast party or just fall in general and in the Christmas too. All this is is really my riff on a stone fence, which is a extremely old school American, like colonial American cocktail, which is simply a spirit and hard cider mixed together. And then what I like to put in it is my favorite ingredient. Can you take a guess what this is, Pam Brophy? It's in a hot sauce bottle because I brought from Cementodram. Bingo. Bingo. Pementodram is my jam. Stop. Stop right now. You've never heard Roger talk about Pementodram before? I have not. Oh. Really? Wow. Roger, I do have a meeting in nine minutes. We might need to talk about it later. No, we're going to talk about it. You're going to be late for your meeting because you're late for this. Pementodram is a Caribbean liqueur that is- Stir this up with your fingers. Kind of all spice. I don't want to stick my fingers in your drink. All spice it. I don't want to put my own fingers in my drink. It's not kind of all spice. Pemento is the plant that all spice is derived from. Yes. So, cinnamon, nutmeg, clove. At least in that language. Not to be confused with the red pepper pemento that you might be shoving into an olive. I could see why people got liquored up on this and started a war. I feel drunk that I'm just smelling it. So what we used here, Pat brought us our favorite brandy producer when it comes to apple brandy is the Laird's family, who's been doing it since the 1700s. Oldest distillery in America. Now, this is a special bottling of Laird's. This is Laird's 10th generation. So they launched this recently. It is a one-off commemorative thing to celebrate the 10th generation of the family to enter the business. It is a bottled in bond five-year-old apple brandy. Awesome. 100 proof apple brandy. It's just, it's awesome. It's great stuff. Somebody taste that neat and tell me how awesome it is. We'll send you a sample, man. It's awesome. So this came in, I want to say in the spring. It's sticking around. It's Laird's, so there's not a huge demand for it, but it's probably in about half the Binny's locations. I think it's 40 or 45 bucks. It's pretty reasonable. Nice. All I have is a lowly bottled and bond Laird's brandy. I made my stone fence with something else. I used Schlatterer Kirschwasser. Ooh, there you go. To make it German. That's expensive. Expensive, but delicious. You're so bougie, Chris. Hey, Arnold Schwarzenegger drinks that, and he made a protein drink with it. You can see the video on the YouTube. Really? It's pretty hilarious. Worth mentioning that we are making October fences, not stone fences. The kind of high toned estuary quality of this Kirschwasser really comes through quite prominently. And that kind of almondy note, it actually works pretty well. Cherry and apple. Yeah, it's nice. Fruits of the forest. Schwarzwalder, apple, something. So again, to kind of put a bow on this guy, you should drink stone fences and you should play around with different lookers in them. So the traditional American way was with rum. Once we started distilling our own booze here, we typically were making bourbon and rye. So try it with those. Or you should also do the other American way, which is with apple brandy, which is what we did. You can also make a pretty awesome version where you mix whiskey, rum, and brandy together, which is what I like to do. That's it. Just all spirits. All spirits. Try Roger Long Island. Long Island Stone Toberfest. What are we calling these things? Oktoberfence. Oktoberfence. So yeah, that mine is with hard cider and put little pimento drem if you want to add a little bit of allspice to it. So there's no connection between this pimento and pimento cheese? No. No. Yeah, it really is. I mean, we can eat this, eat pimento cheese while doing this. Pimento cheese is a southern delight, but it has red pepper pimentos in it. You just have to realize that pimento is another word for allspice berries. But it's rum and sugar and allspice macerated to make this liqueur. And it's a crucial ingredient in a lot of rum cocktails. It just adds depth and complexity and spice, and almost like a bitters in terms of what it can add to a cocktail. But instead of being bitter, it's kind of sweet. Okay. I really like this cocktail. Awesome. And pimento is a very important ingredient in island cuisine, Jamaican cuisine. All right, so it's Oktoberfeast. You've had quite a bit of roasted meats. You've had quite a few liters Steins of beer. You're really full, and you need something to help you with your digestion. Yeah. That's where Pat comes in. So I brought a couple things that you might be served at Oktoberfeast as kind of an after-dinner digestive type of thing. Couple traditional German things. One is Apfel from Flimm, and we sell this in most Binny's locations. This is on the sweeter side of the digestive. So, you know, digestives can be sweet or bitter, and it really depends on what you're being served. Like a typical after-dinner drink can be something very herbal and bitter, or it could be something super sweet, like an old school cordial or something. Even like a Benedictine is classic. That's very sweet. Exactly. So, unlike the cherry schnapps that I had, this is more like a wheat or barley vodka with apple juice added. Am I not correct? Yes. No, that is correct. Here, caramel coloring added too. But it's so it really it's it's 50 proof. So it's 25% alcohol and it just tastes really just like apple juice. Yeah, I was going to say. This is one where it's like, holy cow, you could knock back a bottle and be in a lot of trouble on this. Folks, pity me. I don't have any. Yeah. Which is the same. Now it has a natural apple character to it, like just a clean, fresh apple juice character to it. I think it's delightful. I only tried it recently when we did a class for the staff on like, what does that taste like? Where essentially I just walked down predominantly the liqueur aisle and just grab six or eight random things. It's like, what the heck is this? So anyway, this is the sweeter side of the digestive. They definitely need help with their branding and their label design. It is what it is. It's pretty good. It really does taste like red apples that are just pressed and it's just this light sweet juice. So the Apfel here, definitely a liqueur. Now, the next thing we're going to taste the liqueur as well, and this is a Kumul. Chris, have you had a Kumul? I have, indeed. Probably, I assumed. We're trying Gilka. Kumul is a caraway digestive. It is so weird. This is if rye bread was turned into a distillate and thickened up and sweetened. And really sweetened, though, which is like, I feel like it doesn't need to be so sweet because it's so savory. Yeah, that's funny. It's funny that it is because caraway is so savory. Listen to Savory Podcast. But it's balanced, though, because it's got that bit of sweetness to it. I love it. I think it's really cool. It's got an emperor penguin on it wearing one of those. I'm sure Chris or Roger knows what- Picklehaube. Yeah, okay. Yeah, that's Picklehaube. The pointy German World War I helmet. Penguin in the Picklehaube. 38% alcohol. If you invest in a bottle of this, play around with it. Try putting a little bit into cocktails. Yeah. I was going to say, could you break up some of that sweetness with- Yeah. Just something fizzy in there. I think it would be kind of cool to just put a little caraway element into something bloody Maryish, but not one of the pre-made ones that's loaded with a bunch of spice already. You got some of Chris's tomato water, and then add this as the spice element. It could be really interesting. I just drink it along with ham and cheese. That would work for me too. The obvious pairing is, that's what the label alludes to. You're supposed to pair it with grilled penguin. The perfect way to put a cap on your evening or to start a second evening, because I like to refer to it as the reset button, is none other than the Onderberg. This is one of my all-time favorites. I'm a noted Onderberg lover. It's something I cover in any when we're doing digestives or anything like that with staff training. These are so cute. Mrs. Brophy gets me a literal giant Christmas stocking full of Onderberg bottles every year for Christmas. This is the way to drink Onderberg. Oh, look at this guy. This guy wants to have an Onderberg cup off. Buddy, I was talking about my love of Onderberg, and because I have been a tireless promoter of Onderberg in the United States, I'm actually part of the Gold Cup Club. I have a- You are not. A ragadoccio. Yeah, no, no. I'll bring it off sometime. I was given an Onderberg Crystal Cup that was plated with gold and engraved with my name on it. So these cute little bottles, for those of you who can't see it, maybe you've seen these on a bar shelf in a bandolier. They're famous for that. There's a bandolier in my basement bar full of Onderberg bottles currently. You should wear that regularly. I tried. It's not meant for a man of my thickness. We'll put it that way. I'm trying to drink out of this small bottle. Are there no leather sleeves? We can get you an extension. You need to wear that thing. So to give everyone some perspective, this is 0.67 fluid ounces. Typically, people shoot it. They don't sip on it. It says to feel bright and alert, and that's the goal here. This is a medicinal tonic made for well over 100 years. It's made with herbs from 43 different countries. It's aged in Slovenian oak barrels for several months before they bottle it in these cute little bottles. It's been around since 1846 because so many people, this predates all the stuff that we use now as a culture, like Tums and other antacids and gas medicine and everything else. Yeah, that's what this tastes like. It's gross. Not only that, Roger, but it has a protected status as a Crouter Liquor. Yes, which is a style of Amaro. Technically, Jägermeister is also a Crouter Liquor. You've all had a Crouter Liquor before. Right here on the Underberg label, Underberg is a herb bitters taken for digestion. It is not a beverage, not to be sipped, but taken all at once and quickly because of its aromatic strong taste. You can't take it too fast. It is also used as a flavoring. Brophy is one of the only people that I know that insists on taking it out of the bottle. Oh, yeah. It's pretty difficult to get. It's like in a dropper bottle. I know. He had to put his head back for 25 seconds. No, you have to. You have to drip it in there. But what a lot of people do is they put a little tiny bar straw in the bottle and then it creates air pressure into it so you can actually shoot it. The three people that drink this? There are far more. This is one of the most popular things now in the craft beer business. A bunch of breweries have these behind the bar. Do they serve them with a beer then? No, you just buy them as a digestive. Now, I have always touted the properties of this. This works as a digestive. You could eat Thanksgiving dinner and have an Underberg, and all of a sudden, you could fit a whole other dinner in there. I'm not talking it's not a laxative or something, but if your stomach is full, have an Underberg and all of a sudden, it's just not full. It's really remarkable. Let's just bring that back to the fact that you're going to be pounding a lot of food at Oktoberfeast. That's why we're having this, yes. Yes, little Underberg. I have to say, in the nose, it's like Christmas. It's piney and brown spicy and winter greeny, and clove, loaded with clove. Gentian is a big predominant thing of it too, so it's got that woodsy bitterness. Alicia, you're not alone. I've made people drink this. I've had friends literally throw up after drinking it. I mean, it's pretty hilarious, the wide variance of reactions. My bit's always been for as many people in Chicago as that have fallen in love with and are obsessed with Malort, I would much rather drink Onderberg, and what's interesting with Onderberg is that it exists in this category like cocktail bitters do, It's considered a non-potable bitter, yeah. Yeah. Like Broph said, they're all over some of these tap rooms now that don't have liquor licenses, they just can only sell beer. It's interesting to see it have a whole new life because of that, but as I interjected before, I mean this thing, I always call it the reset button, and as we've all attested here, it really works. It makes you feel better and it truly is medicinal. It says right on the label, it's on all their branding, after a good meal, and that's what it's for. It's a post-meal digestive and it's great, and it's perfect for Oktoberfeast. It's perfect when you're getting really bloated because you're drinking a bunch of fizzy beer or something. And eating all those rich foods. Have an Underberg and you're ready for round two. Boom. It is quite bitter. Do you know, Pat, in addition to gentian, is there wormwood in here? I would assume so, honestly. I mean, it tastes like it. I agree. It has that that that bitter wood. It's not quite piney, but I don't know. You know wormwood when you taste it. You've had malort. Proprietary secret. Of course, like any good Amaro, it is a total family secret for what is actually in it. For those of you who give them pause by the herbs from 43 countries, this has been around since 1846, but it's a modern operation and they test on their website that they test every single batch of herbs that comes in for quality purposes. So you're in good hands with Thunderbird. How do you purchase this tiny bottle? You can buy singles, but increasingly not. We used to sell singles in this little rack. Really now it's three pack bottles that are like five dollars and 30 cents or something for a three pack at your local Binny's. And if you're me, you buy them by the case. So you can eat twice a month. By the bandolier. Yeah, you can request by the case as well just to refill. A case, I want to say, is around 160, 170 bucks. But it lasts about six months if you're at my house. And how many bottles is a bandolier, Finn? You know, I always have my kid fill it up. Perfect. It's one of the, I don't know, it's just one of those chores I could trust my kids to do. Thank God it's a non-potable bitter. She doesn't mind. Hey, if your kids are sneaking that, they're hearty souls. I have the bandolier full and I have backup sleeves underneath the bar in the basement. And the bandolier is like mounted to the wooden post that's at the edge of the bar in the basement actually. All right, so we've taken you on a tour de Oktoberfeast. Hopefully, we've given you some ideas as far as some other delicious beverages you can enjoy or offer your guests. And as Chris has showed on the wine side, just explore the Rieslings, but plenty of other great varieties to dig into from Germany these days. Roger, I can't thank you enough for not making me taste the same six beers for the fifth year in a row. This was great. I like the beer selection. Yeah, the beers we did taste were awesome. And obviously, Underberg is the best thing we had today. Just like he claimed hams. Another Brophy Bar favorite. Yeah, hams on Underberg come to my house. Oh, and PBR now too, I guess. I mean, all of these were good, but they're no PBR. The wines were surprisingly awesome. These cocktails were good. So Oktoberfeast, but more than just beer. That's been fun, guys. We'll see you next week. Do us a favor, leave us a review on Apple Podcasts. Tell your mom about the show. Until next week, I'm Pat. I'm Roger. I'm Alicia. I'm Chris. Keep tasting.