The 3rd annual Oktoberfest to support The New Hampshire Food Bank (NHFB) is a six-hour festival held each year in the Alps of Manchester, New Hampshire at McIntyre Ski Area, Saturday September 20th, from noon-6 pm. It is one of the most famous events in the city and is the largest event put on by the New Hampshire Food Bank with hundreds of people attending every year. Traditional Oktoberfest biers are the beers that have been served at the Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany. The event coordinators of the New Hampshire Food Bank’s Oktoberfest say there will be as many lagers to make you feel like you are in the town of Munich. To wet your whistle, examples of the locally-brewed specialty beers you’ll be able to enjoy include Woodstock Inn Brewery, Farnum Hill Ciders, Pennichuck Brewing Company, Tuckerman’s Brewing Company, LLC, Milly’s Tavern, Smuttynose Brewing Company, Martha’s Exchange Restaurant and Brewery, , Shipyard Brewery, RedHook Ale Brewery, Inc., The Portsmouth Brewery, Magic Hat Brewing Company and Performing Arts Center, and The Boston Beer Company. Admission is $10 and includes a pint glass and entertainment by King Ludwig’s Bavarian Band. Come enjoy food from Red Arrow 24 HR. Diner, KC’s Ribshack, T-Bones Great American Eatery, Commercial Street Fishery, and Famous Dave’s, The Meat House and the Puritan and help a worthy cause. The New Hampshire Food Bank, a program of New Hampshire Catholic Charities, functions as an emergency food distribution center, supplying food to 352 agencies state-wide. The Food Bank is currently facing challenges from all sides. There is a 30-40% increase in demand, and donations are at an all-time low. The warehouse only holds 137,000 pounds of inventory. This is well below the low of 260,000 seen in the past two years, and only a fraction of the average for many years of between 500,000 to 700,000 pounds. To make matters worse, the cost of transporting food is at an all-time high, with diesel at $5/gallon and trucking companies unable to deliver produce from the west coast. "This has challenged us to think about more efficient ways to bring donated food in. We're the only food bank in the state, and we supply all the soup kitchens and food pantries, some 352 agencies from as far away as Berlin and as close as Manchester.”, says Melanie Gosselin, Executive Director of the NHFB. The Food Bank is using events such as this one to raise money to purchase urgently needed food items.