Cerveza De Calabaza
Rock Bottom Restaurant & Brewery

I had this on-tap at the brewery in a big mug.

Appearance: moderately cloudy orange hue with a finger of creamy ivory foam. It even looks like pumpkin pie!

Smell: a great pumpkin pie aroma with a light spicing and just a wonderful pumpkin character. Great!

Taste: like the aroma, a great pumpkin pie flavor that strikes a great balance with its beer backbone. Slightly sweet and very smooth; love it.

Mouthfeel: medium body with a well integrated carbonation and a great creaminess. Bam!

Overall: this beer just rubs me the right way. I could get accidently get myself severely loaded on this.

 

Had this at the Pumpkin Ale festival at Elysian as a guest brew. Pretty damn unusual for a Rock Bottom beer and pretty good evidence that someone there knows what they are doing. This one is brewed with 2-row Munich and C-20 malts. Bittering hops are are Nuggets and aroma hops are Mt. Hood. Equal parts real pumpkin added to the mash, kettle, and fermenter. Spiced with nutmeg, allspice, cloves, cinnamon stick, and grated ginger. Fermented with a Belgian Trappist Ale yeast. Starting gravity of 17.4 degrees plato and 26 ibus. Highly unusual and delicious beer. Made broadly in the Belgian style and with Belgian ale yeast, these notes really come through. Pours orange/amber with a thin head and some lacing. Smells like candi sugar, Belgian yeast, cloves, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Taste is mostly the typical Belgian tang from the yeast, but there is some nice creamy pumpkin as well as some spice on the finish. These flavor combinations work, and I'd like to see some more pumpkin ales done in this style. Mouthfeel is crisp, tangy, and creamy all at once. I really enjoyed this.