After a long year of missing your beloved pumpkin spice, you take that first sip of a latte, and that is when you realize that pumpkin spice is actually overrated.

The flavor is considered a part of fall. We associate it with shorter days, cooler temperatures, comfortable sweaters and apple-picking. It is a taste of nostalgia. 

Even though you can find people saying, “pumpkin spice is overrated” or “pumpkin spice is totally not worth the hype,” it is hard to find an individual who has not indulged in the many pumpkin-flavored offerings.

Sarah Cormie, a Johns Hopkins doctoral candidate studying human olfactory perception, says the smells of pumpkin spice are associated with positive memories like attending a family Thanksgiving, rustling fall leaves and heading back to school. 

Hence, pumpkin spice itself is not an unsavory flavoring. It is a flavor that triggers fond memories, enhancing our experience. 

But the only thing that ruins the enjoyment of seasonal treats like pumpkin spice is the excess uproar over the season itself. 

The same issue is present during the winter season with peppermint and gingerbread. Companies are trying too hard to come up with seasonal products, often producing outlandish results. 

The release of entirely unneeded items such as noodles and toilet paper marketed as pumpkin spice flavoring makes the trend just plain weird. 

Not only have our foods been taken over by pumpkin flavorings this fall, but even dog foods are now available in pumpkin, which is both irrelevant and unnecessary.

Stretching to release heaps of unconventional products with pumpkin attributes makes pumpkin into something it was never meant to be. 

Instead of the nostalgic flavor that is meant to give you a warm fuzzy feeling when the weather gets colder, pumpkin has turned into an overhyped and overrated monstrosity.