We're creeping closer and closer to the big day--just a week out! Soon enough, the veil will thin and kids dressed up as nightmares will prowl the streets seeking candy. The good news is that we're not there. Yet. We still have some time to prep.
So, prep we shall! This evening's a chance to steel our nerves before All Hallows' Eve. I'm doing that with a special beer from Timber Ales: Fields of Fall, the strongest beer of the season. Take a moment to grab a break from carving pumpkins and hanging artificial spiderwebs to enjoy this peaceful moment with me before we're flung into the spookiest day of the year.
So comes October, and so comes the blog's Halloween season. I have a slate of beers ready to go, all of which are new to me. I hope we're in for more treats than tricks. I love pumpkin beers but at times they can be a gamble.
Let's hope today's brew isn't a gamble. We have Abomination's Lil' Pumpky as our Spooky Finger Puppet Ghost Month starter. Let's roll the dice and keep our fingers crossed for treats (which, for this odd analogy, are sixes). Really, though, how could we go wrong with a name like Lil' Pumpky?
10/31/23: Southern Tier Brewing Company's Caramel Pumking Imperial Pumpkin Ale: A Halloween Post
5:28 PMLo!, the veil now grows thin, weakening to a mere patch of gossamer hanging loose in its haphazard suspension betwixt our world and that of those who no longer walk amongst us. Devilry is afoot on this dark and unholy eve, dear reader. I hope that your curtains are drawn tightly over your windows. I hope that you are well-kept against the terror this night brings. I hope that should some manner of ghastly or gruesome creature call upon your door, you are able to appease its infernal appetite with what you are best able to offer, dispelling it forevermore from your dwelling.
What might you offer to this vision upon your step? Well, sweet treats may just suffice. Yet, if this monster prowls low as some horrid feline, something of greater heft and richness may be needed to make it leave you be. Would, perchance, a bottle of Southern Tier's Caramel Pumking would banish the beast? Perhaps, fellow cowerer in the dark. Perhaps.
We're here now, having traveled through the thick of Halloween's horrors to the holiday proper. You may be in the midst of fresh frights yourself, as ghost, goblins, and ghouls of all sorts call upon your door demanding treats in exchange for withholding tricks. Maybe now's a good time for you to dim your porch light for a bit and settle down with a beer. Or two, like I am.
Two? That's correct. Three years ago, MadTree retired The Great PumpCAN, it's pumpkinless pumpkin-flavored beer. While it still appeared on tap during its hiatus, it was absent from store shelves, the "CAN" of its name seemling forgotten. Until this year, when MadTree made my wish come true and resurrected its practice of canning the ale.
That still doesn't explain my two beers of the evening. See, I had squirreled away my final can of 2018's batch. Why? Well, I'd actually planned on aging this can anyway. But, once MadTree made it clear that the ale wouldn't be returning the for the foreseeable future, I vowed to keep hold of my can until PumpCAN's triumphant return. That return's happening now.
This post is about a ghost. No, not an actual ghost. Those don't really exist. Instead, this post is about a ghost beer. It's a bit of a mental leap to get to that claim, so I'll walk you through it.
Around the time I was really started my craft beer journey, MadTree released barrel-aged variants of its The Great PumpCAN. Pumpkin beers and I didn't really see eye to eye at that time and the BA PumpCAN releases weren't even on my radar. It wasn't until I visited MadTree a few months after the release that I saw a poster for the beers and knew what I'd missed out on.
Now, let's pivot to talk about whales. I promise, this loops back around. A whale is a limited, rare, and highly sought-after beer. I've been lucky enough to enjoy a whale or two in my life. But, what's more important to me are my personal whales. These are beers that I'm after--still usually pretty rare--that might not necessarily be on someone else's whale list.
Beyond that, you have your white whales, your Moby Dicks, the ones that get away and, no matter how close you think you are to finally tracking them down, vanish. For five years that's what Bourbon Barrel Aged PumpCAN was to me (and it's what the rum barrel variant of it still is). Then, out of thin air, MadTree broke some beers out of their cellar last fall, BBA Pumpcan among them. My white whale had returned from the dead. A ghost, one that I managed to trap, one that's been haunting my cellar since.
Today, on All Hallow's Eve, I'm tearing into this ghost whale. Let's see if it lives up to the hype I've built around it.
Do you remember back in January when I discussed a beer from Breakside Brewery? If so, you may recall that my buddy from Portland, OR brought it as well as another bottle. In the post, I mentioned that I'd save that second bottle for a time closer to Halloween since it was pumpkiny.
Well, I'm breaking into that second bottle now. All the way from Oregon, we have 2 Towns Ciderhouse's Hollow Jack'd. It's been aging in my cellar since January with a bottling date of "1910HWJ07" (which I'm choosing to interpret as October 7th, 2019). Let's see how the bottle's drinking a year and a week after being bottled.
This is a beer that I found the day I heard about it. A month or so ago, I saw a bottleshop I follow on social media post about it. Intrigued, I resolved to pick it up if I ever happened upon it in the wild. Later that day, I found it in a totally different bottleshop while I was heading home from work. And now here we are.
The beer is R. Shea's Twitchy. I see on the brewery's website that they add another word to the name, but it's not a super good word (and one that I think we should work to de-normalize) so I won't be including it here. Nor is that word anywhere on my can. I figured I should address that early on in the post.
Anyway, this might just be the biggest (ABV-wise) beer I drink this season. If it's not, it up there. Let's get to it.
Long time readers may recall two years ago when I drank Platform's Yammy Yammy, a 7.7% ABV sweet potato pumpkin pie-spiced ale. I didn't like it much. It garnered a 6.0/10 rating.
But, never one to learn lessons, I was tempting into purchasing the two new Yammy varieties Platform dropped for this spooky season: Candied Pecan Yammy and S'mores Yammy. Why? Because I found them easily enough (which might not be so simple to do now--I haven't seen S'mores Yammy in the wild since I grabbed my sixer). How do they stack up to the base sweet potato ale? We'll see!
Has it really been three years since I've talked about Sam Adams on here? I guess so. There's a reason why that is and, by the end of this post, you might just guess what that reason is.
Anyway, it's officially October now, so I can begin my month-long discussion of pumpkin beers/cider(s)/seltzer without getting grief for it. Because, whether you love all things pumpkins spice or hate it, it's in-season starting today.
I'm kicking off the festivities with a beer I've had before, one that I think'll set the bar for the rest of the month. That beer is Samuel Adams' pumpkin offering for 2020: Jack-O.
What's that?! A shadow at the window, behind the curtain? No, don't get up! What are you doing?! Keep the curtains shut, no matter what! Why are you pulling them open? No, shut your eyes! NOW!!
It's too late. You've met your doom. You cannot unsee it now and it will haunt you until there's nothing left. It is: Avery Brewing Company's Rumpkin!
Before this year's legs stop kicking, however, there are still two beers to get through. Today's is one that I wasn't expecting to include when I first started gathering brews for the blowout. But, luck was on my side and my local bottleshop got a few bottles in. Today's pumpkiny, Halloweeny beer is Warped Wing's Bourbon Barrel Aged Flying Heads.
Please, come along with me on this haunted evening as the witching hour draw ever nearer. Tonight, we break into a horrifying beer; one that reminds us of the reason for this nightmarish season. Now that the sun has set and the moon is on the rise, we experience it: The Fear.
The beer open and on the coffee table before me is the biggest yet for the season: Kentucky Pumpkin Barrel Ale. It's tantalizing, and I cannot wait to tear into the brew. So, let's have it.
Given that, I think it's only fair that we discuss this seemingly less-loved brew first--I've always rooted for underdogs. So, here we have today's beer: Southern Tier's Warlock.
Case in point: Tonight's ale is the second 8% ABV beer I've had in two consecutive evenings. Weyerbacher's Imperial Pumpkin Ale should stave off the cold until I get the fire stoked up. But let's see how it fares as a Halloween brew.
I still have plenty of pumpkin brews to get to over the next few weeks, but I figure now might be a good time to take a break from the gourdy goodness. Tonight, we have an ale that's decidedly Halloweeny, but not spiced with cinnamon, nutmeg, or anything else that's graced most of this month's posts. No, tonight I'm going for something else. Tonight, I'm taking a look at Great Lakes' Nosferatu.
So, here we go: Elysian's Night Owl.
Woodchuck's Private Reserve Pumpkin was a beverage that was strange to me. I stumbled upon those stark orange and black bottles soon after I started drinking. I had only recently had the cidery's Fall Harvest (which has since been renamed to Spiced Apple) and fallen in love with it. While I was still hesitant to try beers with pumpkin in them, I figured a pumpkin cider might be up my alley. So, I took the plunge and bought the expensive sixer of the stuff at my local Kroger.
That sixer was a catalyst for me. I hated the cider. But, I figured there had to be something to it. Surely, they wouldn't take such care to make it and sell it at such an high price if it was bad! That cider is what got me to work on improving my taste when it came to cider and beer, an effort which led directly into the creation of this blog. A year later, when I was ready to try Private Reserve Pumpkin again, it was gone. After that initial year, I never saw the stuff again. I was heartbroken.
Fast-forward eight years. I was walking around one of my local bottleshops and had to suppress a squeal when I saw a stack of Woodchuck Pumpkin sixers. Sure the packaging was different (and it was a few bucks cheaper), but that didn't matter. I knew it had to be the triumphant return of that cider I'd despised so long ago. I added it to my cart and squirreled it away until today, when I'm finally able to make a post about it. So, here we are: Pumpkin.
Before jumping into the bottle, I'll note a few things:
- This is last year's Punkuccino. See, a local bottleshop had a plenty left over from last year and, in the early spring, they marked their remaining stock down to two bucks a bomber.
- This isn't the only Elysian pumpkin beer I'm discussing this year; the other'll be Night Owl.
- Elysian is, of course, a shill for AB InBev. I drink AB InBev beers, but I also recognize just how awful the company is. They're the worst.
- I've had this beer before. Many times, in fact (I bought more than a few $2 bombers). While it's not the worst pumpkin beer I've had (that honor goes to Saranac's Pumpkin Ale) nor is it the worst Elysian pumpkin beer I've had (that'd be Dark Knife, also marked down to $2/bomber earlier this year), I can't say I particularly enjoy it. In this post, I'll tell you why that is.
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