Dexter, Michigan’s Jolly Pumpkin Artisan Ales is the first brewery in the U.S. to oak barrel-age 100 percent of its beers. Ron Jeffries — AKA Brewmaster Spooky, AKA Captain Ron — founded the Jolly Pumpkin with his wife, Laurie, in 2004, and their beers have since gained international recognition and received multiple gold medals at the Great American Beer Festival. Jolly Pumpkin takes great care in maturing their beers. Each brew is fermented in open-air tanks and aged in oak casks. The beers are then further matured in the bottle with the addition of more yeast, also known as bottle re-fermentation. This process creates a beer that ages extremely well as the yeast continue to consume the sugars in the bottle, changing flavors, producing alcohol and causing natural carbonation. The name Jolly Pumpkin was one in a long list of possibilities, but it was the one Jeffries kept coming back to because it made him laugh. “Jolly Pumpkin” also embodies some of his favorite things: Halloween, pirates and the tropics. Today, Peaks and Pints presents a flight of Jolly Pumpkin we call Craft Beer Crosscut 10.19.18: A Flight of Jolly Pumpkin.
Craft Beer Crosscut 10.19.18: A Flight of Jolly Pumpkin
Jolly Pumpkin Bam Di Castagna
4.5% ABV, 27 IBU
Bam Biére is Jolly Pumpkin’s delicious farmhouse ale named for the brewery’s Jack Russell, who struck by a car, bounced back in fine tenacious Jack Russell fashion. Bam Di Castagna is a fall inspired version of Bam Biére, brewed with chestnuts in the mash. It pours a rich auburn that’s gently tart with notes of earthy chestnuts, flavors of cashew, taro and traces of autumn smoke.
Jolly Pumpkin Problem No Problem
7.6% ABV, 22 IBU
The third collaboration Jolly Pumpkin brewed with Monkish Brewing Company in Torrance, California, Problem No Problem doesn’t have problems. Brewed with Pilsner Malt, Munich 10, jasmine rice, wild rice, green lentils, palm sugar, sweet orange peel, bitter orange peel, cumin, ground ginger, mustard seed, coriander, fenugreek, Tellicherry peppercorn and Wakatu hops, this saison hits the nose with brown sugar, oak, and funk. Expect flavors of oak, maple syrup and just a hint of spices that pairs well with the subtle funk and light tartness.
Jolly Pumpkin Oro De Calabaza
8% ABV, 30 IBU
After a blind taste test in 2010, The New York Times named Jolly Pumpkin’s Oro de Calabaza Golden Ale the best Belgian-style ale — out-Belgium-ing even actual Belgian ales. Brewed in the Franco-Belgian tradition of strong golden ales — using open fermentation, a cultured Belgian yeast, as well as the wild yeasts of Dexter, Oro de Calabaza is finished in Chardonnay barrels. Flavors of spicy honeysuckle, pepper and buttery oak seem lead notes of fresh fruit that jump from the glass. With a sourness that’ll slap you into the moment, it finishes with balance, a gentle hop bouquet and the beguiling influence of wild yeast.
Jolly Pumpkin Madrugada Obscura
8.1% ABV, 37 IBU
Translating to “Dark Dawn,” Madrugada Obscura is described as a “roasty, malty stout” that the Dexter-based brewer only produces for the winter months. It’s a dark and slightly sour stout, but a little more full-bodied than Jolly Pumpkin’s other offerings. It pours nearly black with beautiful dark bubbles. Smelling sweetly of alcohol, cherries, molasses and chocolate, the flavor is reminiscent of Mexican chocolate, bitter with a hint of spice at the end.
Jolly Pumpkin Simcoe Single Hop
6% ABV, 60 IBU
Simcoe Single Hop is the first beer in Jolly Pumpkin’s Hop Portal Series, which showcases the unique characteristics that a specific hop variety imparts on a beer. This sour pale ale was brewed exclusively with Simcoe hops, but is well balanced with Simcoe’s vibrant, dank and earthiness on one side and Jolly Pumpkin’s funk on the other, with stone fruit notes as an added bonus.
