The Ultimate Oktoberfest Party Guide
Can’t make it to Munich this year? Don’t fret. This is your Ultimate Oktoberfest Party Guide with everything you need to oompah your night away. You’ll find food, drink, and recipe ideas, decorations, a roundup of Oktoberfests in the United States and Canada, plus plenty of anecdotes and trivia to keep guests smiling. Read more.
Unpack your lederhosen and dirndl and start planning the party. We’ll help you with menu ideas, delicious ingredients, and festive accessories for the ultimate Oktoberfest buffet. Best of all, everything is available in North America—right here in our store.
The top 15 “must have” ingredients
Perfect for your buffet—and you can shop them right here in this store:
- Bratwurst
- Black Forest Ham ,
- Original Frankfurters ,
- Bavarian-style Pretzels
- Westphalian whole grain breads
- Allgau Cheese ,
- Sweet to hot mustards and curry ketchup from Duesseldorf and Bremen
- Tangy pickles and sauerkraut from South-West Germany.
- Spaetzle Noodles and Bavarian Potato Dumplings
- Savory Snacks, like pretzel sticks
- Make Your Own Gummy Bears kit.
- Bee Sting Cake or Black Forest Chocolate Cherry Cake
- Bavarian Mozart Kugel or Luebecker Marzipan
- Refreshing Radler soft drinks
- Non-Alcoholic Beer
For your convenience, we curated two Oktoberfest Collections for 4 and 8 guests—available either with perishable products (think fresh pretzels and sausages) or pantry-stable items if you’re shipping early, gifting, or hosting later.
Surf our sister site www.germanfoods.org. We've compiled a host of unique, authentic recipes on our Oktoberfest Recipe Collection page—perfect for building your buffet from snacks to mains to desserts. Altogether, the site features over 700 recipes, so you can mix and match classics and new favorites without breaking a sweat.
Bavarian and German decorations
No problem—we’ve got them, too. Set the scene with Bavarian blue-and-white touches, steins and tableware, bunting, and cozy beer-garden vibes. A few well-placed decorations turn any room into a mini Wiesn and make every photo look celebration-ready.
No matter if you prefer Mozart, mild pop, or heavy metal—you have to play the Chicken Dance. Composed by Swiss musician Werner Thomas in the 1950s and originally known as the Duck Dance, the tune morphed into the Bird Dance and eventually the Chicken Dance over the decades. It’s the number one Oktoberfest hit, complete with easy, follow-along moves. In the 1980s, the version with lyrics by Frank Zander (“If we all were angels”) hit the charts. Here’s the German and English text if you’d like to sing along.
What's so "cool" about Oktoberfest
Keep guests entertained with quick bits of history, stats, and anecdotes from the Munich Oktoberfest—why it started, how it grew, and the traditions that traveled the world. A little trivia between courses keeps the energy lively and the conversation flowing.
Oktoberfest in the United States and Canada
Still want to go out and party with crowds? No problem—find the most prominent Oktoberfests in your state or province in our list, which we compile and update each year (click the link above). Know of another large, multi-day Oktoberfest in your area? Drop us a line with the website link and details so we can add it.
