Pumpkin Beer Is A Scourge On Bars

Brace yourself — we're headed straight into pumpkin spice season. Honestly, at this point, we should just rename "fall" to "pumpkin spice."

Most of the time, these season-specific products are easy to avoid during the day. Starbucks doesn't demand you order the PSL. You can easily dodge the questionable products at the grocery store. But then you try and go grab a happy hour beer with friends — and suddenly every tap has a glaring jack-o'-lantern staring at you when all you want is a nice hefeweizen.

Look, I'm a fan of seasonal brews. I'll gladly order a summer beer or sample other limited-run beers when available, but does a bar need to load all of its taps with the most inconsistent beer style out there?

Sometimes a pumpkin beer is a good, well-balanced beer, and other times it's cloyingly sweet and comes with a sugar rim. It's too much and too unpredictable. Sure, if a bar is slow enough, you can sample before you commit, but that's not always the case. I want to see variety on tap — and I don't want to see only pumpkins.

There is one person here at The Daily Meal who is firmly on Team Pumpkin Beer. Read her rebuttal here. 

Alyssa Haak is the restaurant and city guide editor who likes saying it's her job to eat or drink that. Follow her on Instagram at @akhaak.