This is the end of a fantastic Oktoberfest season for me. For the fifth year in a row, as soon as the first local Oktoberfest beers hit shelves, I started my quest. It’s a journey to find the “best” Cincinnati Oktoberfest beer that takes me through a massive bracket, head-to-head matchups between every single packaged Cincinnati Oktoberfest beer, and culminates in a live event to let the final four battle it out in a blind, head to head face off.

There are always a lot of great beers (32 of them this year), and almost any of them could, and deserve to, win – but only one can.

This year’s finals took place in the beer garden at Sonder Brewing Company in Mason, Ohio – last year’s winner – and MadTree, Sonder, Third Eye, and West Side Brewing battled it out together before triumphantly, MadTree’s Ziegler came through as this year’s champion (Their second time winning “The Golden Gnome” trophy).

Huge thanks to all who came and hung out to watch the finals this year! We’ll be back at it again next year, so stay tuned!