Dark Castle Pumpkin Ale Beer Extract Beer Recipe Kit

Head banging amber pumpkin delight!

A Note to the Discriminating Home Brewer: In the interests of full disclosure, this is the recipe formerly known as "Glauben Globen Pumpkin Alt Beer".  Why the name change?  Because who the hell has ever heard of the beer style known as "altbier"?  If you name a beer "altbier", you might as well add the tag, "Do Not Buy".  True, one or two people know (and love) the style, but the term "altbier" has been effectively drowned out by IPA.  Session IPA.  West Coast IPA.  Hazy New England IPA.  Dysentery IPA.  Did we mention IPA?  Yet altbiers are amazing German amber ales that deserve attention amidst the drowning background noise of the latest-rage beer styles.  We first tried the name "Glauben Globen", which was a silly pun from the Def Leppard song "Rock of Ages", but because no one has ever heard of Def Leppard (and even to mention the name dates us back to a bunch of 80s losers), we understood it was time for a better hook.  So why did we call it "Dark Castle"?  In the immortal words of Quentin Tarantino from Kill Bill Volume 1, "...because it sounds cool."  And now after this marketing bullshit, let's continue with the show....

Warning Homebrewers! This beer is in direct and willing violation of the German Purity Law known as the Reinheitsgebot. For those of you with weak or compromised constitutions, we recommend you stop reading right now.

Okay, so for those of you left, you'll be interested to know that when we confronted our master brewer with the challenge of creating a mouth-watering pumpkin ale married to a classic German Altbier, he raised his fist in the air and declared, "Reinheitsgebot? I wipe my ass with the Reinheitsgebot!" Okay, such fiery artistic sensibilities seem a bit extreme, but with the result featuring a palette of velvety malt and discriminating caramel perfectly balanced with noble hop bitterness, all lusciously layered with real pumpkin and pumpkin pie spice, how can you complain? And when you see Hans and Franz rushing with the defibrillator to resuscitate Herr Kaiser, chief of the Reinheitsgebot Police quivering on the floor, you can raise your pints and proudly toast to the abolishment of good 'ol boy laws and to many mouthfuls of great taste!