Monday, September 25, 2017

What Is Oktoberfest, Anyway?

Oktoberfest beer soft pretzels

This year, from Sept. 16 to Oct. 3, the world is celebrating Oktoberfest. To most (myself included), that means cracking a beer or six for no reason except that, hey, it’s Oktoberfest. But, while you’re knee-deep in beer, food you can’t pronounce, folksy music, and carnival-style games, do you ever stop and wonder: “What the hell is this all about?” Well, I’m here to tell you every single thing you need to know about Oktoberfest!

Let’s start with a little history lesson. How did this whole Oktoberfest thing get started? Well, back in—you guessed it—October of 1810, Crown Prince Ludwig of Bavaria, Germany married Princess Therese of Saxe-Hildburghausen. Imagine the price of customizing those invitations. Anyway, they invited literally everyone in Munich to their wedding and threw a whole shindig on a field Therese so humbly called “Theresienwiese.” These are the fields right in front of the Munich gates that Oktoberfest is still celebrated on today, except now they’re called “the Wiesn” for convenience. Six days after the Prince and Princess got married, a bunch of rich people got together and organized a horse race (probably in their honor, but no one really agrees on that), which I guess the people of Germany were really fond of, because they decided to hold an annual horse race right on the Wiesn. Every year, the horse races got more and more popular, and people started adding more games and celebration. That celebration is what we call Oktoberfest today! It’s all just a never-ending wedding reception.

Now let’s get to the fun part: how is a traditional Oktoberfest celebrated today? Well first, you’ll notice that the first beer of the festival is not served until noon. That’s because tradition says that at noon, the Lord Mayor opens the first beer barrel of the entire festival and declares “O’zapft is,” which means “it’s tapped.” It also means Oktoberfest is officially a go. Next, on the first Sunday of Oktoberfest, you’ll notice a lot of people—I’m talking like, 8,000 people—in traditional Bavarian clothing, waving flags and playing traditional music (polka, yodeling, the like). That’s because a bunch of notable Bavarians and excited denizens put on one of the largest parades in the world, all to honor the wedding of Crown Prince Ludwig and Therese with the Long Name. Finally, Oktoberfest is one giant festival. There are rides, a Ferris wheel, game booths, and food stalls—just like your local carnival, only a million times bigger.

Finally, the real reason you’re reading this article. What about the food?! What about the beer?!?! Let’s dive on into that! So, you’re drinking a lot. I’m not judging you, I’m just saying you’ll need some hearty food to keep you going. You’ll find a lot of traditional German dishes to do the trick: sauerkraut, cabbage, schnitzel, soft pretzels, pork knuckles, grilled whitefish, smoked sausages, and spaetzle, just to say the least. For dessert, gingerbread necklaces are a very popular delicacy and souvenir. Since Oktoberfest really is a celebration of love after all, it’s common for gingerbread cookies to be iced with romantic messages that people can give to their significant others. Really cute stuff going on here.

Let’s get to the beer now. As you may well imagine, Oktoberfest takes its beer very seriously. Turns out, there are only six breweries in Munich (Paulaner, Spaten, Hacker-Pschorr, Augustiner, Hofbräu, and Löwenbräu), and if the beer isn’t from any of those breweries, you’re not finding it at Oktoberfest. The beers all have at least a 6% alcohol content and, for the most part, are served in one-liter steins. Finally, in 1516, a Reinheitsgebot—or “purity”—law was passed to make sure all German breweries were producing the highest quality beer. All Oktoberfest beers must meet these standards, so you know you’re drinking the best of the best.

So, now that you’ve got all this knowledge, you can take your zest for Oktoberfest straight to the Wiesn and go crazy. Use these next few weeks to eat, drink, and be merry!



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Liquid Cuisine

There are many ingredient and technical challenges that come into play when creating, manufacturing, and scaling up soups and broths. Whether beginning from a base of dairy, broth, or tomato, soups made for batch production have one thing in common: Consumers demand that they taste homemade.

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Cuisine d’Auteur: Chef Daniela Soto-Innes Finds Success in Simplicity

This article is brought to you by our friends at Stella Artois. 

At only 26 years-old, it wouldn’t be wrong to assume that Daniela Soto-Innes is ticking off all of the boxes of an elaborate, carefully crafted career plan. The Mexico City-born chef has already garnered the James Beard Rising Star Chef of the Year Award, as well as a spot in The World’s 50 Best annual list of top restaurants for her critically-acclaimed cuisine at Cosme. But if you sit down with the remarkably sincere and considerate Brooklynite, you’ll quickly learn that her approach to food, life, and navigating New York’s competitive dining scene is anything but complicated. In fact, it’s actually quite simple.

“We don’t have any rules. The only rule is to make something delicious,” Soto-Innes says of her overall cooking philosophy.

After moving to Texas at age 12, Soto-Innes didn’t necessarily see a future in the kitchen. Her passion for creating meals and highlighting seasonal ingredients lent itself to opportunities that were hard to pass up, which later transitioned into a full-time career.

“I’ve always been really open to learn any type of thing,” she says.

Culinary school and cooking stints in Houston and Mexico City eventually led her under the wing of esteemed chef and restaurateur Enrique Olvera. It’s through Olvera that she learned to fine-tune her craft and create unfussy, albeit delicious Mexican dishes that obviously resonated with diners.

“Sometimes it’s nice to keep it simple. I’ve learned, as I cook more, that the simpler, the better, ” she says. “You want to cook the way you feel at home. You want to cook in a way where you don’t scare people away or make them uncomfortable.”

While she welcomes “adventurous” eaters and more modernized cooking techniques, keeping the flavors and preparation straightforward and harmonious will always be a constant.

“Sometimes, the more complicated the dish looks, the more people don’t want to eat it,” she argues.

At the end of the day, isn’t bold taste and seemingly effortless presentation what Mexican food is all about? If so, it’s safe to say that Daniela Soto-Innes just might be one of the most masterful chefs of Mexican cuisine in the U.S. today.

Stay tuned for more chef stories as part of Stella Artois’ Cuisine d’Auteur series that highlights the process of conceptualizing, creating, and elevating food to the level of art. 



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Sausage Rolls

Sausage Rolls

When I had a houseful of teenagers to feed, I often made this version of pigs in a blanket: fresh sausages wrapped in dough from my local pizzeria, baked until golden and crusty. The kids loved them and when my parents joined us for dinner, they did too.

You have to have one recipe that is practically as easy as ordering pizza, after all. This is mine.

Continue reading "Sausage Rolls" »



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Cole’s Quality Foods Middles

Middles become available later this month in the freezer section at grocery, club, supermarket and convenience stores nationwide for a suggested retail price of $3.99 per 10.8-ounce box. Each box contains eight bread bites.

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Veggie Noodle Co. Opens New Facility

The new building will employ over 250 people locally and is a SQF level 3 food production facility, meeting the highest level of comprehensive implementation of food safety and quality management

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Mariani Nut Snack Packs

Continuing to meet the needs of retail customers and consumers, Mariani Nut Company now offers snack-sized 1.5-ounce packages of whole almonds and whole roasted almonds with sea salt.

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Amazing Grass Debuts Packaging Refresh, Chocolate Flavor

Crafted with organic cocoa, Amazing Grass Chocolate Protein SuperFood contains a unique blend of USDA organic pea, hemp, chia and quinoa, delivering 20 grams of complete plant-based protein per serving.

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Today’s Millennial: Tomorrow’s Organic Parent

Twenty-five percent of the Millennials in America are parents. In the next 10 to 15 years, 80% of Millennials will be moms and dads. What this means for the organic market could be transformative.

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