page_title: Pale lager
section_title: Oktoberfestbier/Märzen
hierarchical_section_title: Pale lager / Strong lager / Oktoberfestbier/Märzen
caption_attribution_description: English: An 11.2 ounce (330 ml) bottle of Paulaner Oktoberfest Märzen poured into a glass beer mug.
context_page_description: Pale lager is a very pale-to-golden-colored lager beer with a well-attenuated body and a varying degree of noble hop bitterness.
  The brewing process for this beer developed in the mid-19th century, when Gabriel Sedlmayr took pale ale brewing techniques back to the Spaten Brewery in Germany and applied them to existing lagering methods. This approach was picked up by other brewers, most notably Josef Groll of Bavaria, who produced Pilsner Urquell in the city of Pilsen, Austria-Hungary. The resulting Pilsner beers—pale-colored, lean and stable—gradually spread around the globe to become the most common form of beer consumed in the world today.
context_section_description: Oktoberfest is a German festival dating from 1810, and Oktoberfestbiers are the beers that have been served at the festival since 1818, and are supplied by six breweries: Spaten, Löwenbräu, Augustiner-Bräu, Hofbräu-München, Paulaner and Hacker-Pschorr. Traditionally Oktoberfestbiers were the lagers of around 5.5 to 6 abv called Märzen, brewed in March and allowed to ferment slowly during the summer months. Originally these would have been dark lagers, but from 1872 a strong March brewed version of an amber-red Vienna lager made by Josef Sedlmayr became the favorite Oktoberfestbier. The color of Märzen and so Oktoberfestbier has become even lighter since the late 20th century, with all Oktoberfest beers brewed in Munich since 1990 being golden in color; though some Munich brewers still produce darker versions, mostly for export to the United States.
  Oktoberfestbier is a registered trademark of the big six Munich breweries, who call themselves the Club of Munich Brewers. Oktoberfestbier is also known as Munich beer, and—along with Bavarian beer—Munich beer is protected by the European Union as a Protected Geographical Indication (PGI).
caption: A mug of Paulaner Oktoberfest beer
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