CBE12 - Lawnmowers for Rakes Part 2

As a second football week peters out, the CBE was given something that we haven't seen since winter ended... Some cooler weather.  The perfect opportunity to drink some of the beers in the #CBE12 mix.  I took full advantage of that.  I was also watching some games while finishing up Part 2 of the newsletter, and most of it was constructed on an iPad, so I hope the formatting isn't completely ridiculous. And I don't know how pictures are going to work on this. I hope well, or at the very least acceptably.

From the trunk of newly minted parents, the first beer on the second part of this newsletter is Smuttynose Pumpkin.  I went through a few of these last season, and as far as pumpkin beers go, this one is interesting because it's not overwhelming.  It's the Oktoberfest of pumpkin beers. Unlike the Weyerbacher and Dogfish Head, you can have a few of them and continue to enjoy football games all day.  A lot of people say pumpkin doesn't taste like anything, and it's the spices that make a good pumpkin beer. To them, I say, pompion tastes like this...

Smuttynose Pumpkin Ale is our homage to the craft and heritage of America’s brewers. Recipes calling for the use of pumpkins in beer date back to early colonial times, when brewers sought to extend their supply of costly imported malt with locally grown ingredients, such as squash and “pompions.”

In that spirit, we brew our ale with the addition of pumpkin to the mash, along with traditional spices to create a delicious American original.

I've had more and more Southern Tier beers of late, and they're good.  Harvest was kind of a gamble. Not a pumpkin, not an Oktoberfest.  I figured it would be a hoppy and malty fall favorite.  It actually tastes a little grapfruity to me. As far as fall seasonals, it definitely leans to the hoppy side.  It's definitely something I'll be keeping an eye out for, as well as other offerings from Southern Tier.  It's a great "change of pace" from some of the other CBE12 selections.

Harvest Ale is our celebration of the changing weather and the sowing of hops and barley that will be used in our upcoming brews. We usher in the fall with a classic English style Extra Special Bitter of the highest order. Deep ruby in color with an even deeper hop flavor… in fact, we throw fresh English hops into every brewing vessel, then dry hop after fermentation to impart a zesty kick. This beer has real hop character that mingles with fresh malted barley for an experience that will make you wish it were fall year ‘round. 

Cisco Pumple Drumkin.  If brewery's websites had any influence on beer ratings, this would be the worst rated beer of all time.  Even worse than the Breckenridge Vanilla Porter.  Luckily for Cisco, Nantucket, and the entire state of Massachusetts, that is not the case.  The website is the worst.  This one tastes like you should melt marshmallows on it and serve it as the sweet potato casserole at Thanksgiving dinner. It's definitely full bodied, lots of spices going on, but the spices seem a little more subdued than they do in some of the other pumpkin beers. This one tastes like putting a scoop of pumpkin guts into your yam when your about half way through emptying one out to carve some dopey three toothed face into one.  It also has one of the coolest pumpkin beer labels.

Our Pumple Drumkin Ale is a fall favorite on the island.  A deep orange hue and a subtle pie aroma meet a robust male character in this ale which, true to its seasonal reveling, tastes like toasted pie crust in your mouth.  It will finish clean and dry on the palate and leave you wishing that every day could be autumn on Nantucket!

Uinta makes a black lager called Baba.  As in black sheep.  It comes in cans, and I drank some of it this summer.  It's delicious.  I was kind of hoping that the Philly Brewing Company Schwarzinger was going to be like that.  It is vaguely, but it's admittedly not as good. Oddly, none of the bottles that I've consumed have had any head retention.  They were also kind of oddly tart.  And not as roasty as I was hoping they would be.  It's also new enough that there are not comprehensive ratings on any website to get an idea of how well it's being received.  And the website only says...

A German style black lager brewed with premium pilsner and dark roasted malts.

I really enjoy a lot of PBC beers.  The Newbold IPA is pretty good, the Joe Porter (coffee porter) is a favorite of mine.  The Walt Wit is really great.  I was hoping for more.  Maybe next time.

Enjoy your football, enjoy the weather as it finally gets cool enough to actually enjoy these beers.  Enjoy that CBE12 gave you two newsletters for the price of one.  Keep an eye out for Souther Tier Pumking, Stevens Point Whole Hog Pumpkin and Williamsberg AleWerks Pumpkin Ale.  Those will stand up to any of the pumpkins in CBE12.

CBE 12 - Lawnmowers for Rakes Part 1

Nothing says the end of summer like Labor Day.  A short three day weekend, made even shorter by high levels of traffic, anxiety filled family visits, and rained out barbecues.  In an effort to see how quickly we can forget summer and welcome the annual trade of mowers for rakes, CBE proudly presents the first ever fall seasonal exchange.  Filled with a variety of beers that probably would be best drank a month or two from now, as we ease into cooler temperatures and another horrendous Eagles season.  With no further ado, I introduce the concept of seasonal creep...

Yes, it's not October, there are still a handful of 80 plus degree days in our future, the leaves have not actually fallen yet, so it may be too early for pumpkin beers.  Over the past several weeks though, these pumpkin beers have begun to swamp shelve space in all of my favorite beers stores (ie Wegmans and Whole Foods.)  But if you don't buy them now, they're not going to be around when you actually want to drink them anyway, so just consider the middle of August to be the start of fall, and crank up the AC.  There are actually some good reasons for these beers hitting shelves early, as there are for spring and summer beers creeping into the end of winter.  I weeded through a handful of articles and feedback on the subject, and here are some of the more interesting and thoughtful ones.  From Schlafly, Scranton Times Leader, and some idiot at the New York Village Voice.  That last one's important because there is a quote from a Sixpoint brewer about pumpkin beers being released in July/August not being made with fresh pumpkin.  Duh.  But until Sixpoint makes a pumpkin beer that's even half as good as Dogfish Head's or  Southern Tier Pumking, that's not an appropriate argument for waiting until November or December to release pumpkin beers.  It's interesting to read brewers takes, distributors opinions, and customer feedback on the subject.  The bottom line is that we're going to continue to get seasonal beers earlier and earlier every year, because they get allocated earlier and earlier, which means they're going to be sold out earlier and earlier every year.  Which is awesome... I think.  At least we live in a world where distributors (in this specific case Brewers in Mt Airy) now carry 30 odd seasonal selections from just as many breweries, instead of bringing in Camo Cans of Milwaukees Best to welcome Fall.