My (until recently) Pumpkin Problem

The other day I found myself at Tangletown drinking pumpkin ales with a couple of old friends and thought to myself, "self, these pumpkin biers are becoming a pretty big deal." It seems like any brewery with the capacity to make seasonal biers has dabbled in the pumpkin.

As I am with many hot new popular trends, I was skeptical. Why add pumpkin? Is pumpkin ice cream really that good? Are pumpkin seeds really appetizing? I don't find myself craving the innards when I carve jack-o-lanterns, so why should we put this stuff in bier? I figured we were eating pumpkin ice cream because all other fruits had been exhausted by the ice cream industry. And pumpkin seeds were the result of sunflower seeds' success resulting in seed companies wanting to draw more people into their chew-and-spit eating department. Pumpkin bier, huh. Sounds about as good as some domestic "Michelada" style aberration of decent drink.

Here is a short discussion of what I had and what I thought. I'm trying out my skills at bier evaluation for the first time. I'm not very good at it, and if you find yourself in strong dissagreement, please educate me.


Elysian Dark O' the Moon Pumpkin Stout. Playful in the nose, both with roasty chocolate aroma and hints of cinnamon-like spices. My first taste was gentle, very smooth indeed. The stout's bitter nature is here complemented with the taste of pumpkin pie and something like carrot cake. It finished cleanly, credit due for a nicely brewed example of a stout, well balanced with the pumpkin presentation. Nice bier.

Elysian The Great Pumpkin Imperial Ale. Imperial ales are by nature strong in both bitterness and alcohol, so I was ready for a wild man. What I smelled was less of a pumpkin pie spice and more like actual gamey pumpkin innards like I mentioned before. This made me more nervous, so needless to say I was amazed by how nicely it tasted. The hop bitterness was there immediately, like it always is, but then the alcohol warming was followed side by side with a genuinely pleasant flavor of sweet pumpkin meat. This bier is what turned it all around for me. Elysian involved pumpkin in the mash, the kettle and the fermentation of this bier, and their labor worked with incredible success to present to the drinker mr. pumpkin in all his glory.


After these I also tasted a very rich scotch-style pumpkin ale, but was unable to remember its name or enough of the details to warrant a description. And that imperial ale knocked me about to Mars so my pallet was done working for the day.

If you found yourself disliking my criticism of the way pumpkin gets slathered all across this season, I hope you will see now how I've learned that there are gems out there amongst the slatherings. I probably need to stop doubting the hot new trends so quickly without first doing a little research. I don't know why I so mistrust the public opinion. Perhaps it is because the most popular bier in the country is But Light. Then again, the folks who encouraged me to try pumpkin ales aren't exactly Bud Light drinkers. PBR and Rainier are their go-to's, and I'm definitely not too cool for vitamin R. Prost!