It’s undeniably fall, with leaves everywhere, the signature grey gloom, and just about everyone’s thoughts turning to cozy sweaters, fireplaces, and the bounty of the season. For most people, the fall harvest equates to apples and pumpkins for pies. For me though? Skip the crust, I just want to know how you can ferment them!

While pumpkin beer can be the perfect drink for a cold and dark fall afternoon, apple cider is more about a stroll down a leaf-strewn country road: crisp, clean, and refreshing. The common misconception is that hard ciders are sweet, just like the non-alcoholic ones but, in fact, most of the best ciders have a brisk acidity and a pleasant dryness that just gives a hint of apple fruit without overwhelming the palate with too much sugar.

The delights of drinking cider are manifold, but for me several stand out. The first is the opportunity to drink as simple an alcoholic beverage as there is. While of course there are exceptions, many ciders consist of little more than just fermented apple (or pear, or cherry, or apricot, etc) juice and some water. Unlike beer, which is the confluence of multiple grains, hops, and possibly malt, or wine which is often influenced by the vessel in which it’s aged, ciders tend to be solely about the quality and type of fruit that constitutes them.

Cider is also an essential part of American history. It was in many cases the main drink that pioneers, frontiersmen, and settlers drank, as it was safer and more potable than water. It took advantage of the vast array of apple trees planted and disseminated by John Chapman (better known as Johnny Appleseed) and others. It also helped establish Americans as different from their European forebears, even sometimes to ill effect. Despite its status as an occasional indulgence, it was once among the most common beverages in the country.

Of course, in the Pacific Northwest we have an almost endless bounty of apples so it’s little surprise that a number of different ciders are made in the area. A personal favorite of mine is the Wild Washington apple cider from Tieton Ciderworks in the Yakima Valley. With a wealth of interesting tropical notes and a pronounced minerality, it makes for an interesting wine replacement with pork or cheese courses.

Blurring the line between cider and beer are dry-hopped ciders. As in beer, hops are added during the fermentation process to give the cider a slightly bitter flavor and a more pronounced florality. This is especially useful when, on their own, the cider might be sweeter than desired. Finn River in Chimacum on the Olympic Peninsula does a very nice job with their Dry Hopped Cider.

While pumpkin beer doesn’t have quite the connection to American history as cider, it’s an even more essentially American drink. Pumpkins (and all other squashes) are native to the Americas, so it wasn’t until the arrival of European brewing techniques that anyone really made a pumpkin beer. In fact, pumpkin beers were relatively widespread through the Northeast. Because it can be made with almost any style of beer, with wildly different amounts of pumpkin, and to differing levels of sweetness, richness, and spice, there’s probably a pumpkin beer out there for almost any drinker.

In most cases, brewers add pumpkin at some point in the fermentation process, along with a host of spices that we associate with pumpkin pie: nutmeg, clove, cinnamon, allspice, and a bunch of others. In fact, some rely on just those spices to flavor the beer, leaving the pumpkin itself out all together.

Going relatively light on the pumpkin and spices, and using a lighter-styled beer as the base, will give you a crisper, clean-tasting pumpkin ale like the Fall Hornin’ from Anderson Valley or Elysian Brewing’s Night Owl. Both sit around 6% ABV, making them suitable for a fall picnic in the woods.

On the other hand, if you’re lavish with the pumpkin and spices, and start with a porter or stout, you wind up with the kind of beer that will serve as comfort in the midst of a raging windstorm. For me, the Harvest Harlot from Pike Brewing, deep and rich with a wealth of spices and sweet vanilla notes on display, is the perfect beer for wrapping myself in a blanket, staring at the pouring rain, and being really glad that I didn’t have any greater ambition today than taking a nap.

For more information on this season’s apples, check out our Voracious blog.

Or to find out which wines pair best with apple preparations, check out last week’s Bar Code here. [link TK]