Sunday, October 28, 2012
The Definitive Guide to Pumpkin Beers, Part I/?
Fall CLEARLY means pumpkin! (Unless you are my older brother and his dog, who are disgusted and terrified of pumpkins, respectively.) I really do love pumpkin foods, and just recently started getting into slaughtering my own pumpkin, which has lead to more pumpkin lasagna and pumpkin ice cream.
I know a lot of people get excited about pumpkin lattes and muffins and pies and sweet things, but I prefer pumpkin as a vegetable rather than as a dessert (I do love pie, just not all the time!). Subsequently, I admit am kind of picky about my pumpkin beers.While most people enjoy sweeter, nicely spiced brews, I prefer mine to be milder (though still spiced). I have ridiculously high expectations for my pumpkin beers, and while I enjoy most, there are very few that I just simply LOVE.
This post will include all of the pumpkin beers in my database, although I admit it's been a few years and my tastes have changed. I'm just going to copy my reviews word for word from my list--
Dogfish Head Punkin Ale: as far as pumpkin beer goes, probably the winner
Harvest Moon Pumpkin Ale: (This one had two entries by accident, that even show how my tastes have changed!) my favorite pumpkin ale/ too sweet
Mad Fox Punkinator: perfect awesome non-pie spicy but not sweet pumpkin ale (I can only assume I mean pie spiced but not pie sweet)
Michelob's Jack's Pumpkin Spice Ale: (I tried this one with my grandma!) the spices are nice but there are better pumpkin beers out there
Sam Adams: spice but no pumpkin
Starr Hill's Boxcar Pumpkin Porter: a nicely spiced porter
The Shipyard's Pumpkinhead Ale: DELICIOUS. But confuses my tastebuds, meaning, what on earth do I drink next?
The Shipyard's Smashed Pumpkin: "It's like a Belgian pumpkin ale!" -Gurzo
Triumph's Pumpkin Ale: very much like pumpkin pie but smooth and not too sweet
Weyerbacher Imperial Pumpkin Ale: recommended by NoJo (Noah Joseph). Tastes like pie. Good spices but too sweet. Smooth, but not my favorite pumpkin.
Williamsburg Alewerks Pumpkin Ale: too pie like for me
It was interesting to read through these again. Ha. Yay fall! Part II coming soon of pumpkin beers that I've tried recently and have better notes on, and can give a more current and better seasoned (spiced?) opinion on.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
I had Dogfish head, Starr Hill, and Williamsburg Alewerks recently. We got a growler of Punkin Ale, which went pretty quick in a room full of grad students - I loved it, seemed really well balanced. Starr Hill's porter didn't seem to have muck pumpkin to it, was definitely on the milder side of the selection. Alewerks was way to sweet for me - though Papa Masur seemed to like it (but he is a big fan of pie, after all).
ReplyDeleteI don't recall the Starr Hill having much pumpkin flavor at all. I generally love all that Dogfish Head does, so I should really hunt some of that down to try again. I went through a bunch of new ones recently though-- stay tuned for Part II!
ReplyDelete