More Pumpkins!!

Still goin with the pumpkins!  Don't hate...  I love pumpkin beers, get over it!

First off..yep, that's a Sam Adams in a Brooklyn pint glass... shut up.  It's all my girlfriend had at her place.. I know it's blasphemous for a Bostonian..whatever.  Work with what ya got, right?  Samuel Adams - Harvest Pumpkin Ale.. Brand new for this year in their Harvest Collection, but also released as a 6er cause, hey, who doens't love Pumpkin beers!  5.7% ABV and 14 IBUs... deep amber orange pour with a heavy bready malt aroma and hints of a sweet, canned pumpkin coming through with some brown sugar and a bit of allspice.  Taste was fairly straightforward, a solid rookie pumpkin offering from Sam.  A nice balance between fresh and fake, canned pumpkin with a decent malt backbone of caramel and toasty bread.  Not much hops, as the standard pumpkin should be.  Super drinkable..very sessionable.  Not so much spice there's no pumpkin, not so sweet there's no spice.

Hoppin' Frog - Frog's Hollow Double Pumpkin Ale.  8.4% ABV and only 7.3 measly IBUs.  only 7.3...wow!  never seen a sub-10!  And double pumpkin sounds amazing!  But the aroma...  total artificial canned pumpkin with store-bought spice aroma over a think veil of candied caramel sweetness.  Already somewhat disappointed by this and the taste didn't help.  Now yes, 8.4% is fairly high, but also fairly common now in craft beer, but the alcohol came through much more like a 10 or 11% barleywine and didn't fit in well. There was more of that fake pumpkin taste with an uber-sweet malt profile like drinking watered-down maple syrup with honey in it.  The spices seems straight from a pumpkin pie and super subdued.  I was hoping for way more.. maybe it's the very low IBUs contributing to the weird taste and not holding back the medium alcohol content..

some definite let-downs thus far in the Pumpkin beer category....