"Pumpkin spice latte season began at a well-known coffee chain in late August. Thanks to the phenomenon known as pumpkin creep - the earlier and earlier arrival of pumpkin-flavored beverages each year - pumpkin beer season starts earlier now too. But that's not a bad thing: beers made with pumpkin, and more often pumpkin spice, are already on store shelves and will be hanging around through Thanksgiving or until they run out."
"When early colonists first arrived in New England, they discovered that barley didn't grow very well, and they looked around for an alternative fermentable substitute. Some of the crops that Native Americans taught the settlers to grow were corn and pumpkins, which were grown together to more efficiently use farm space. Since beer was safer to drink than water, they couldn't be too picky, so they started making beer with pumpkins, as well as other locally grown ingredients, like artichokes, parsnips, persimmons, spruce tips."
Pumpkin-flavored beverages now arrive earlier each year, moving pumpkin beer season forward as well. Pumpkin and pumpkin-spice beers appear on store shelves by late summer and often remain through Thanksgiving or until sold out. The pumpkin-beer tradition dates to colonial New England, when settlers used pumpkins and other native crops as fermentable substitutes because barley failed locally and beer was safer than water. Early beers included ingredients such as artichokes, parsnips, persimmons, spruce tips and molasses. Industrial-scale barley production ended the practice until craft brewers revived pumpkin ales in the mid-1980s, notably Buffalo Bill's Pumpkin Ale from around 1986.
Read at Boston Herald
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