The 31 is offered alongside of a goodly number of fall beer selections that range in flavor from autumn harvest inspired to all out pumpkin pie spices in a jar with some hops. This beer has an okay amber color- I’ve seen a good number that look prettier in a glass and a fair number that look far more dreadful. I don’t know- anytime I think of pumpkin spices, for some reason I want my beer to be a strong amber or golden color- a bit of pumpkin flair. But I need to remind myself that no one is actually using pumpkin in their brew- it’s just the holiday spice blend to jazz things up.
This beer is woefully lack of the cinnamon and nutmeg flavors that the label boasts. I don’t think this is a bad thing at all however because I’m not a fan of drinkable pumpkin pie. I enjoy the flavors of fall- but some folks are a bit heavy handed with spices as beer additives. I picked up some nuttiness from the beer that I really liked. It wasn’t a bad pumpkin beer but it certainly isn’t my favorite. DuClaw does have the 31 in a Double Spiced variant that I have not tried.
The beer wasn’t quite dark enough to my hillbilly snobbish tendencies either. When I drink a dunkel- I want that puppy to be DARK. Now I know for darn tootin’ stouts are darker than dunkels… but this one was still a bit too light visually for me.
If the beer is done Munich style and its following reinheitsgebot, then all the cinnamon and nutmeg flavors are coming right off the hop and malt blends and not from something that was added to the brew. Im always skeptical but with all the malt and hop variants out there today- it’s possible.
All in all, it’s not a bad find for the fall season, but it’s not a grand slam gotta get a keg of that for the harvest hoedown.
