Here’s the next post in my “Pumpkin Beer Project” for the season, featuring a gluten-free pumpkin beer: Lunar Harvest Pumpkin Ale from Ghostfish Brewing.

Ghostfish Brewing Company is located in Seattle, and is dedicated to brewing 100% gluten-free beers, the first brewery in Washington state to do so. Opened in 2015, the brewery offers six year-round beers and a variety of seasonals. Ghostfish beers entered the Oregon market in 2017, the same year the brewery picked up medals at Best of Craft Beer Awards and GABF.

Here’s a bit about the gluten-free beers and ingredients from the FAQ:

Are all your beers gluten-free?
Yes! No gluten-containing ingredients are permitted into our production facility, and every single ingredient in every single one of our beers is naturally gluten-free. Any ingredient that is not produced in a dedicated facility is tested and certified gluten-free.

Our taproom kitchen is also 100% gluten-free. No gluten-containing ingredients ever come into contact with any of our kitchen equipment.

What ingredients do you use to make your beers?
Our beers are primarily made from malted millet, which is a very small gluten-free grain that is grown all over the world. In some beers, we also use malted and unmalted buckwheat, which is also naturally gluten-free, and not remotely related to wheat—it’s actually a cousin of rhubarb! Both of these malts are available to us in a variety of different roast levels, allowing us to achieve a tremendous variety of colors and flavors in our beers.

In addition to these main grains, we use both malted and unmalted brown rice, unmalted white sorghum, and Belgian candi (date and beet sugar) syrup in some beers. We use certified gluten-free oats sparingly in select beers. We also occasionally experiment with a variety of unrefined sugars, such as demerera, piloncillo, agave nectar, and honey, but do not currently use these sugars in any packaged beers.

Lunar Harvest Pumpkin Ale is 5% ABV with 20 IBUs, and the listed ingredients are water, millet, buckwheat, rice, lactose, brown sugar, pumpkin puree, hops, spices, and yeast. The website description says:

We brew our annual pumpkin ale in a classic Belgian-style. Spiced with a traditional mix of Fall spices, all which blend seamlessly with the naturally spicy and fruity Belgian yeast character. It’s like liquid pumpkin pie!

Using a Belgian yeast is a good choice for a gluten-free formulation here, as it can complement the spices and help offset the chlorophenolic-like character that I often find that alternative/GF malted grains can exhibit. (Quick clarification on this: when buckwheat and/or sorghum are used as a primary fermentable, the aroma often includes band-aid or a medicinal character that you’d get from chlorophenols. Knowing it’s a grain issue I don’t consider this a fault in the usual sense, but it’s not always pleasant either.)

I reached out to Ghostfish with some questions about the beer, and co-owner and sales and marketing manager Brian Thiel replied; the first question relates to a discrepancy with what was listed on the website (since fixed) and what was listed on the can:

I see the website does not list pumpkin as an ingredient, but the can does, along with brown sugar I believe; was real pumpkin used in this beer and if so, how much and how was it used/incorporated?
Thanks for pointing out the discrepancy between the ingredients listed on our website and the ingredients listed on our cans. The can listed ingredients are correct.

Pumpkin puree was used in this year’s Lunar Harvest. Based on a 15bbl recipe, 50 lbs of pumpkin puree was added to the mash and 50 lbs was added to the whirlpool.

Can you share what spices were used, and how those are added? (e.g. end of boil, in the secondary/conditioning, etc.)
The following spices were incorporated into LH: cloves, allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger. All of these spices were added to the whirlpool

When was Lunar Harvest first brewed?
Lunar Harvest has been our annual fall seasonal for the past three years. Each year’s Lunar Harvest has been a little different than the year prior. The last two years of LH have been similar in nature in regards to the use of a Belgian yeast

Do you find any issues or complications brewing a gluten free beer with pumpkin and spices?
No issues or complications brewing Lunar Harvest as a 100% gluten-free beer using pumpkin and spices. IMO, our grains (millet, brown rice, and buckwheat) provide a nice sweet malt backbone to this fall treat.

Note that pumpkin was used both in the mash and the whirlpool, and spices were added during whirlpool as well rather than in secondary conditioning (“dry spicing”). I suspect whirlpooling the pumpkin is a great way to add (raw) flavor to the finished beer.

Lunar Harvest is available in 16-ounce cans though it’s at the tail end of its availability, so snap one up if you see it.

Appearance: Good clarity and a bright, deep copper color. The head is ample and off-white to light tan in color, crisp and rocky.

Smell: Pumpkin pie spice medley, with nutmeg and cloves prominent, and then the band aid notes that I mentioned above. Underneath there’s a grainy sweetness. The gluten-free chlorophenol-like aroma becomes stronger as the beer warms.

Taste: Amber beer (grainy, toasted malts, slightly dark bread crust, lightly sweet with a hint of dry almost-roasty nuttiness) with a touch of grassy vegetal and a bit of spice that borders on bark/woody/astringent. Toasty biscuit, cloves and allspice, light squash, and a hint of that chlorophenolic character at the back but not nearly as prominent as in the nose.

Mouthfeel: Medium-light body, with a crisp (almost sharp) bite to it. Finishes with a lightly astringent spice kick at the back (a bit reminiscent of nut shells).

Overall: The medicinal issue was expected and not a deterrent, and the spices were expressed well in the aroma. Flavor was right in line with a biscuity amber pumpkin ale, perhaps a slight tip towards woodiness with the spicing but not overdone and all-in-all a well-done pumpkin beer for those who can’t consume gluten.