Dogfish Head Punkin Ale

Brewed by Dogfish Head Brewery
Style: Spice/Herb/Vegetable
Milton, Delaware USA

12 oz bottle. Pours clear amber with a medium off-white head. Aroma of cinnamon, allspice, clove, tart fruit and hops. Malty flavor with lots of cinnamon and clove with apple and a mild hop finish.

Deep copper color with a small head. Spicy aroma dominated by nutmeg and allspice. Interesting taste combo with the brown sugar, molasses and the pumpkin spices mingling with the roasted malts. Still detected a nice hop presence in the smooth finish. A great alternative to ciders in the fall.

Pumpkin beers are too much of a novelty. Every Halloween/Thanksgiving they sell like hotcakes. This is one of the better ones, but I can go without pumpkin beer a bit longer...

One of the more pumpkin flavored pumpkin beers I’ve had. Bottle from brawley’s beverage. Pumpkin flavors mixed with some cinnamon spices makes this is a subtle good brew. Not an overpowering spicey experience. Medium bodied. Little to no sweetness.

From a 12oz Bottle. Pours a mostly transparent, brassy amber color with a thick layer of well sustaining snowy white head. Lots of spices in the nose, especially focusing on the nutmeg. Shades of cinnimon and a touch of pumpkin present, but it really seems focused on the spice character and not as much on the pumpkin. The pumpkin is there, it just doesn’t have a meaty or juicy aroma. Some spicy herbal hops linger as well. Medium bodied, full carbonation that provides the tongue with a tiny shimmering bubble massage. Too much hops and even some higher fusel alcohols jump out on the palate right away, which seems a bit surprising considering the ABV isn’t really that high. The pumpkin character grabs the tongue briefly before a devasting juggernaut of hop bitterness destroys any semblence of pumpkin-esque chewy sweetness. The spices get a bit out of control at the backend as well, with the mace adding to the astringency of the hops and alcohol. This beer isn’t completely wrong, I just find myself evaluating it like it were one of my homebrews. If I were to brew this "again", I would up the pumpkin, lower the IBU’s, and ferment it at a lower temperature. But then again it’s not my beer.

12oz - Aroma is clove, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Pours a clear orange with litle head and lacing. Flavor is spicy, yet not very flavorfull. Nutmeg, clove, and maltyness does not recover form lack of character. Palate is not really there. I’m not really a fan of the style, but it isn’t very interesting in any case.

Looks like an ESB, except it has no head. I don't like the flavor of this one at all, I can't explain it, it is slight dry, nutmeg and cinnamon are subtle a best, leaving only some brown sugar and roast pumpkin, yuck. Surpisingly the aroma had alot of ale qualities.

12 oz bottle


I picked up a four pack of this as it looked interesting on the shelf and Dogfish Head has never disappointed me yet. It does seem a bit early for pumpkin beers (I picked up in mid-August) but perhaps it is like Christmas sales - every year they move up a few days.

Aroma / Appearance - The nose is relatively simple but clean at the same time. I picked up a nice variety including malt, pumpkin, corriander, nutmeg, cinnamon and a trace of something sweet. The body was a nice transparent ruby with active carbonation and a one-finger head close to the color of mocha.

Flavor / Palate - There was alot going on inside such a small bottle. First I picked up pumpkin pie, spiciness (not the hot variety but more like an allspice), pepper, butterscotch, whipped cream and malts. There was a trace of hops but it took some effort to pick it up. The later sips revealed a strange set of flavors - orange peels, lemon cookies and butternut squash. This is definitely a fall beer. The mouthfeel is satisfying with a caramel finish. Overall a well done beer for a cool autumn evening.