How Megan attempted to win a pumpkin carving contest with the pumpkin keg

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IMG_1336-1Did y’all catch that DIY pumpkin keg video that went viral? The moment I saw it I thought, “now THERE’S a Megan-simple pumpkin carving project!” Because, much like my cooking skills, my crafting skills are, well, let’s just say sub-par. I was invited to my friends 6th annual Halloween pumpkin carving contest and I accepted with the express intent of trying my hand at the pumpkin keg. The video makes it seem so simple, spoiler alert: it wasn’t!

I arrived to the party an hour late, carving was already commencing. Thank gawd this didn’t take to much creativity. Here’s how I pulled off the pumpkin keg…

After three trips to home improvement stores, I realized that the plastic spigot they used in the video is kind of a specialty item. I should have ordered it from Amazon a couple weeks before. But I’m a lazy bitch, so of course I waited until the last minute. Which means, in my quest to find the holy spigot, I finally ended up at a Home Depot (30 minutes after the party had started) and asked if they had anything that would work. As fate would have it, I asked the perfect employee — he had just helped a girl figure out what would work for the exact same pumpkin keg idea. What we came up with was this combo of metal hose bib and a plastic make-shift nut, to secure the hose bib to the pumpkin.

Here’s are the pumpkin keg steps:

Draw a ring around the top.

Cut the ring off the top and scoop out the guts.

Cut a hole in the front just slightly smaller than your spigot and shove that puppy in there.

Then take your plastic “nut” or whatever piece you’ve found to cap off the back of your spigot and screw it in from inside the pumpkin. This was the really hard part, because my pumpkin was super thick, so I had to scrape away at the flesh on the inside, around the spigot pipe, until the pip was poking through the hole enough to secure the nut onto it.

Then fill it up with beer and start pouring! Cheers!

Sadly, my pumpkin did not win the contest. Jeesh, what does a girl have to do to win!? Apparently a girl has to either…

Create a small zombie pumpkin feasting on the brains of a larger pumpking. Founders award winner.
Create a pumpkin that looks like a hamburger. Third place.
This pumpkin had iPods inside and displayed creepy eyeballs looking around in the eye holes and snakes writhing around in the mouth hole. Second place.
Or create a dreamcatcher out of a pumpkin and its guts. Homies, meet ‘the nightmare catcher!’ First place.
The winners being announced.

Here are other pumpkins that I loved but, like my keg, didn’t win either:

The Hello Kitty pumpkin has glittery ears!
The UFP: unidentified flying pumpkin.
This piece was called “Jack my lantern.”
Baby Pumpkin Mouth is sweeping the nation.

So what does YOUR Halloween pumpkin look like? Extra points if you have photos or your pumpkin got you drunk!

Comments on How Megan attempted to win a pumpkin carving contest with the pumpkin keg

  1. These pumpkins are UNREAL! They put every pumpkin I’ve ever carved to shame. Obviously people take this contest pretty seriously.

    I love the idea of a pumpkin cider dispenser!

  2. If you guys can believe it, there are actually more AMAZING pumpkins that I can’t even feature because they’re actually *gasp* too risque for even Offbeat Home!

  3. These are great! One tip with the pumpkin kegs, you should use a torch (like a blow torch or a creme brûlée torch) to singe the inside. This creates a seal and stops the bitter rind taste from leaching into your yummy beer.

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