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| Boo? Pumking: Surprising, if not scary |
I held back trying any until at least the end of September. I think the first example may have showed up in July. (Breweries are getting to be as bad as department stores with getting a jump on the seasonal crowd.) But the one I broke my fast on was Dogfish Head's well-respected "Punkin Ale". It was on draft, so I caved. And it was delightful, with only a subtle hint of pumpkin pie. I can take a tad of cinnamon in my beer once the leaves start to turn burned.
Since then I've sampled a few other squashy offerings, including Star Hill's "Boxcar" pumpkin porter, Smuttynose's "Pumpkin Ale" pumpkin ale and Cisco Brewers' "Pumple Drumkin" (from Nantucket!). All pretty solid examples of the historic beer style that emerged, similar to oatmeal stouts, generations ago as a nutritionally fortifying beverage. And like oatmeal stouts, pumpkin beers -- with and without actual pumpkin puree -- have made a wicked comeback in the past few seasons.
One of the people's favorites is this "large format" (1.6 pint, in this case) bottle pictured above: Southern Tier Brewing Company (Lakewood, NY) "Pumking". My local Whole Foods beer guru says he has doubled his order of Pumking each of the last few years, and each year has trouble keeping it in stock. People leave with cases -- cases! -- of it. WF sells it for about $7 per bottle, or 1/2-2/3 the cost of a delicious craft six-pack.
Why so much love for the "king"?
1. First of all, beer-lovers really dig anything seasonal, limited release, etc that comes in 22oz-750ml glass. It implies use for a special occasion or social occasion, because as the consumer, you and or your buddies are obligated to consume all of it in one sitting, else it go flat. That or as an aspiring macho man, the more imposing vessel looks a lot manlier held in one hand than a dinky 12oz bottle. Size matters.
2. Being seasonal or limited release is a marketing gimmick that works every time. Think about the "Disney Vault": the magical mystical warehouse where they store all the retired animated features while they're on indefinite break from being sold in stores. The commercial announcer's voice goes "And now, for a limited time, 'Aladdin' is coming out of the Disney Vault in a digitally remastered format..." BUY NOW, BUY NOW, BUY NOW OR YOU MAY NEVER SEE "ALADDIN" AGAIN EVER. Beer buyers can be hoarders, and even if it's a brew that may not be suited to basement aging over time, we still have to have it. Because it may never be let out of the vault again.
3. Pumking ABV = 8.6%. Again: 8.6%. Strength matters. Most other pumpkin beers are somewhere in the 4-5% range -- a good beer average in general. But in our competitive, testosterone-infused beer culture, ABV is just another metric that's an opportunity for one-up-manship. IBUs -- same thing. IPAs and Double IPAs are wildly popular. Why? My sense is plenty of brewers and consumers are more than happy to sacrifice taste and drinkability for a padded stat line.
"We may not have the best tasting or artfully complex beer," a proud sell-out brewer might say, "but boy did we ever force-feed it a metric ton of hops and sugar! Enjoy our ATOMIC BITTER BALL-BUSTER: One sip will not only get you immediately hammered, but is so bitter your face will implode." Hands down contest winner.
Now while the Pumking is attractively stronger than your average beer, it is thankfully not a hoppy behemoth as well. In fact, its subtle bitterness only comes on at the very finish of the taste, making that a minor palate component.
What is prominent, however, is a strong sense of cake I get immediately, on first sip. Yes, cake, like cake batter ice cream. There's also some nuttiness -- hazelnut, perhaps -- and caramel notes, true to the specially chosen malts, but the cake remains front and center. Even in the context of a delicious mix of spices and a round, squashy fullness from the pumpkin added during fermentation, this beer tastes like eating a strange dessert.
And maybe that's what STBC is going for. Maybe that unique "bouquet" is what helps people keep coming back and buying more and more cases. It certainly doesn't taste like any other beer I've had. But I'd give it a "Good, not Great" rating. I tried some of two different bottles, and in neither case did I get much complexity in the taste -- any richness of flavor that befits the bottle calling specifically for a goblet, much less the large format status, price tag and celebratory aesthetic.
I had hoped a beer brewed "with Pagan spirit" would have been more inspirational on All Hallows Eve, but like Charlie Brown's "Great Pumpkin", I was left wanting for anything supernatural.
There's always next year.
