302. New Belgium Brewing Company (Fort Collins, CO) - Voodoo Ranger Atomic Pumpkin

“At 6.4% ABV, Atomic Pumpkin is perfectly positioned to capture the fall beer drinker who wants more than just an ordinary Pumpkin or Oktoberfest beer.”

There are four blurbs of Tasting Notes on the website, and between those four blurbs, they use the words ‘slight’ or ‘slightly’ six times, with respect to other descriptors such as sweetness, bitterness, herbal, spiciness, alcohol-warming, and astringent. The Beer Facts (keep scrolling after Tasting Notes) reveal that Saigon cinnamon and habanero chile have been incorporated into the brew. I don’t drink many pumpkin beers, so maybe I’m just missing the pumpkin in this one; or maybe pumpkin is a subtler flavor than I expect it to be; but unless that is a flash of pumpkin in the brief, initial sweetness, then this is just a spicy cinnamon ale that is going to give me heartburn. And yet…I can’t quite bring myself to call it bad. It’s certainly not something I would ever buy again, but it is one of the more interesting beers I have tried in a long time.