O'Fallon Pumpkin Beer

Last time I reviewed two huge pumpkin beers, each weighing in around a hefty 8.5% alcohol.  I like a good strong beer and drink them fairly often, but sometimes I like it when I can drink several beers in one sitting without needing to lean on something when I stand up.  An 8.5% behemoth like Pumking just won’t do in that case; you need something more reasonable.  Oftentimes this means sacrificing flavor intensity for drinkability; a weaker beer is made with fewer ingredients, and fewer ingredients mean fewer flavors.  This is why, say, Keystone Light tastes like carbonated rice water.

Fortunately, O’Fallon Brewery out of Missouri does not seem to like watery beer.  Prior to trying their Pumpkin Ale a few days ago, the only other beer of theirs I ever drank was Smoke---a porter brewed with smoked barley.  It might be the most intensely smoky beer I have ever tasted, even more than much stronger beers.  I pretty much expected the same treatment with their Pumpkin beer, but they made a very approachable and quaffable beer instead.  I don’t mind.

If I was holding this up to the light, you'd see it is actually a bit brighter.

O’Fallon Pumpkin is a much brighter-colored beer than the previous two pumpkin beers I reviewed, though it is a touch hazier.  Underneath the golden-amber color is a spirited carbonation level chock full of fine bubbles, leaving a film of lacing around the glass edges.  It can never get beyond half a finger in height though.

O’Fallon’s website says they brew this beer with 136 pounds of pumpkins per barrel and then finish it off with a spice mixture of cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves (the label says it is brewed with pureed pumpkin and a “spice tea”).  That much pumpkin sounds like overkill, but it doesn’t smell overpowering.  I can appreciate a more distinct pumpkin aroma than Pumking, but it does not have the rich pumpkin pie spice aroma that Pumking does.  O’Fallon seems content to let the gourd itself shine.  I do smell the cloves though; it gives the beer an almost hefeweizen-esque character (almost),

When I first sip it, the beer drinks the same each time.  There is a balanced, delicious pumpkin flavor right away, followed by a quick dash of cinnamon.  The finish is long, but slightly different with each sip.  One time I taste mostly cloves, and another time I taste a bit more nutmeg.  One sip gave me the only hint of the underlying malt bill, a simple cereal grain flavor that reminded me a bit of a bock actually.  The evolving, kaleidoscopic finish keeps it interesting.  The aggressive carbonation keeps it light and a bit airy, the lack of malt sweetness/underdeveloped body being this beer’s only minor issue.

This is a great beer for both slow sipping and multiple pours.  A solid “B” here.