Otto Ferments on 34/70, the World's Default Lager Yeast

The amber half of Twin Elephant's two-lager fest release, at the same 6.2 percent as its pale sibling. German malt, noble hops, and a yeast strain the brewery named outright rather than leaving to the imagination.

• Style: Marzen
• Release Date: 2026-09-18
• ABV: 6.2%
• Twin Elephant Brewing Company (Chatham, NJ)

Twin Elephant is putting out two festival lagers on Friday at exactly the same strength. Hannelore is the pale one. Otto is the amber one.

Otto is the Marzen, arriving September 18 at 6.2 percent ABV in one-pint cans. The brewery calls it a modern take on a classic Marzen lager, and lists German malts for toasty depth and noble hops for balance. Twin Elephant reports freshly baked bread, soft biscuit, light toast and a subtle floral and herbal noble hop lift. Its own summary is smooth, malt-forward and endlessly drinkable, designed to work in a pint glass and a festival stein alike.

The detail worth pulling out of that list is the yeast, because the brewery names it: 34/70.

Most release sheets do not. 34/70, properly Weihenstephan 34/70, is the most widely used lager yeast in the world, and a large share of the commercial lager most drinkers have had was fermented with it or something descended from it. Naming it is less a reveal than a statement of intent. It is the strain brewers reach for when they want fermentation to be invisible, finishing clean and steady and leaving the malt bill standing on its own.

That choice carries more weight in a Marzen than it would elsewhere. There is no hop aroma to hide behind here and nothing else in the recipe to distract from a rough edge. The grain and the fermentation are the whole beer, so a strain selected specifically for getting out of the way is doing real work.

The pairing with Hannelore is the other thing to note. Twin Elephant has released both halves of the modern Oktoberfest split at once, and set them at identical ABV. Hannelore is the pale, golden style now poured in Munich. Otto is the amber Marzen that came before it. Neither is presented as the correct answer. The names follow the same logic, a matched pair of German given names on a matched pair of fest lagers.

Otto arrives alongside Hannelore and a Schwarzbier called Kaputte Stuhle, one day before the brewery's Wenig (Little) Oktoberfest. That runs Saturday, September 19, from 2 to 7 p.m. in Chatham, with fest beer releases, a food pairing and a steinholding competition.