Lancaster Baked Pumpkin Ale

Review Date 10/15/2023  By John Staradumsky

 

Style: Pumpkin Beer

  Brewery: Lancaster   Country: USA   State: Pennsylvania   $ Per OZ: $.18 (B)   ABV: 7.5%

Here’s another beer I’ve wanted to try for a long, long time-and finally did: Lancaster Baked Pumpkin Ale. To be sure, I have had beers from Lancaster Brewing before, and I even wrote a review of their classic Lancaster Milk Stout way back in 2006. I am quite sure I had had it before then, too. I could never seem to find their Baked Pumpkin Ale, though, which was a shame, as much as I love pumpkin beers. Until now.

I finally found it at Half Time Beverage, and of course right into my cart it went. I drank it shortly after it showed up at my door, and I was not disappointed. Pumpkin Ales are the original American beer style, you see, though the originals would not have been spiced as pumpkin pie is today.

Barley and hops were in short supply in early colonial America, so why not ferment pumpkin flesh? They could, and they did. The Pilgrims loved their beer, after all, and my own ancestor William Bradford, who was a passenger on the Mayflower and the first governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, is sometimes credited with the famous passage on why they landed at Plymouth Rock: our victuals being much spent, especially our beer.

Take that, you craft beer loving Johnny-come-latelys. My family was making beer runs for decent brew centuries before you were born.

Lancaster Baked Pumpkin Ale has an alcohol content of 7.5% by volume with 20 IBUs. I paid $3.49 for my bottle from Half Time, and you can buy it at Total Wine for $12.99 a six-pack at their Wilmington, Delaware location. My bottle has no freshness dating.

Lancaster Baked Pumpkin Ale pours to a bright orange color with a thick fluffy white head and a nose of pumpkin, caramel and spice. Taking a sip, the beer is medium in body, just right for the style. I get a bit of caramel, stringy vegetal pumpkin, buttery crust, dark brown sugar, and spices of nutmeg, clove, and cinnamon. The spices pop in the finish and dry the beer nicely.

Lancaster Baked Pumpkin Ale was definitely worth the wait, and you don’t even have to ask: I would certainly buy it again.

Glad I tried it?  T