Dogfish Pumpkin Clone Questions

Hey guys.. I am looking to make this recipe this weekend. Its a clone I found on here and on other sites of DFH's Punkin Ale.

Ingredients
10 lbs pale 2 row malt
1 lbs Special Roast
1 lbs Crystal 60
2-large cans libbys pumpkin in the mash

1 lbs brown sugar @ 60 min
1 ounces Hallertauer @ 60 min
1 1/2 TBS PUMPKIN PIE SPICE, boil 15 minutes
1 tablet of whirlfloc @ 15 minutes
1 oz. Hallertauer finishing @ 5 minutes

Mash 60 mins at 152*

Wyeast American ale yeast

Has anyone else made it? Any additional info or pointers? My plan is to bake the canned pumpkin on a cookie sheet for about a hour at around 325. Let that cool to room temp then put it in when I start the mash. Figure I will do about 1.5qts per lb of grain and pumpkin. So assuming "large cans" are 28oz I figure 12lbs grain and 3.75lbs of pumpkin. That would give me close to 6 gallons of strike water. Would anyone suggest less? Should I just do 1.5qts per the 12lbs of grain? Any input or suggestions are welcomed!

I haven't made the recipe you have here, but I do make a mean pumpkin ale once a year. I use a boatload of pumpkin in the mash, about 4lbs. Bake it at 350 for 30-45 mins at 350. I also include about 1lb in the boil. Whatever you do, make sure you put 1-1.5lbs of rice hulls prior to mash, or it will stick and/or run slower than molasses in winter. It took me just over 2 hours to sparge my last 11 gallon batch with only 1.5lbs in the entire mash.

I have this in my primary right now. I haven't tasted a fermented sample yet, but I did sample the wort right before I pitched and it was amazing. I can't wait for this beer to be done. Gonna secondary it this weekend so I will get to sample as well.

Haven't made it, but recipe looks great.

Yeah I had planned to throw a couple handfuls of rice hulls in with the mash.

formula2fast, how much strike water did you use?

Looks very similar to this recipe. I brewed this one last weekend so it's still got a few weeks to go, but it smells great. I used .75 lb of rice hulls and had no issues lautering or sparging. As for mash water volume, I was a little confused about this as well because most pumpkin ale recipes I have seen use more water in the mash then typical beers. I guess the idea is to compensate for the pumpkin in the mash. I used the water volume listed in this recipe and it worked fine.

brew2enjoy said:

Looks very similar to this recipe. I brewed this one last weekend so it's still got a few weeks to go, but it smells great. I used .75 lb of rice hulls and had no issues lautering or sparging. As for sparge water volume, I was a little confused about this as well because most pumpkin ale recipes I have seen use more water in the mash then typical beers. I guess the idea is to compensate for the pumpkin in the mash. I used the water volume listed in this recipe and it worked fine.

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Awesome.. I guess I didnt find this post because I wasnt putting "punkin" in for my search. That will help out a lot.. thanks!

I made that exact recipe last season. It is a great beer, but it is alot heavier than most commercial examples of pumpkin ales. It is pretty close to being more of a higher ABV pumpkin stout.

If you want a lighter pumpkin ale that tastes like pumpkin pie, find one that is based on an amber ale base, like the Austin Home Brew, Midwest, or Northern Brewer pumpkin ale recipes.

If you are interested in a heavier beer that's malty, roasty, with a tinge of pumpkin profile, the DFH clone is a good heavier beer!

TopherM said:

I made that exact recipe last season. It is a great beer, but it is alot heavier than most commercial examples of pumpkin ales. It is pretty close to being more of a higher ABV pumpkin stout.

If you want a lighter pumpkin ale that tastes like pumpkin pie, find one that is based on an amber ale base, like the Austin Home Brew, Midwest, or Northern Brewer pumpkin ale recipes.

If you are interested in a heavier beer that's malty, roasty, with a tinge of pumpkin profile, the DFH clone is a good heavier beer!

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I have made the Austin Homebrew ale version for the past couple years. I like it, but I am looking for something a little more bold so it sounds like this will be a great choice! Thanks!

Is that 1.5 tablespoons of pumpkin pie spice? My word, that's a lot. I'd take that down a bit, move it to 5 mins, and maybe reduce the last hallertau addition to .5oz.

BBentley, I also entered that DFH Pumpkin clone as a pumpkin stout in a BJCP contest in the veggie beer category, and scored a composite 31, which I was pretty happy with!

I put 1.5 tablespoons of pumpkin pie spice in mine, and I just sampled it today while racking to secondary, and I could not taste it at all. Granted my recipe had a bit more grain in it and is currently at 9.25%, but even with the malty and alcohol flavor, I had no spice. I am going to add more at bottling.

With that in mind, I did have a very vigorous fermentation and blew out almost 1 gallon of beer into my blow off tube bowl, so perhaps the spice floats on top and got pushed out with all the krausen and yeast. Even with no spice and a dash of hot alcohol flavoring, this beer is great and with time and more spice might be the best I have made yet.

Well I brewed this recipe on Sunday.. we will have to see how it turns out. It is fermenting like crazy right now. I did miss my OG by a bit... only got to 1.054.. was expecting closer to 1.065. Think I had to valve open to little to much on my MLT and it might have drained a little to fast. I will update the thread in a couple weeks with a FG and first thoughts on a sample.

I'm giving this recipe a go soon. Do you have any tips on adding the pumpkin? Were you able to hit your strike temp? Oh, and how much rice hulls did you add? I think that's it for now. Thanks man!

Chris

Francis said:

I'm giving this recipe a go soon. Do you have any tips on adding the pumpkin? Were you able to hit your strike temp? Oh, and how much rice hulls did you add? I think that's it for now. Thanks man!

Chris

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On the pumpkin I baked it spread out on a cookie sheet at 350 for about a hour. Then I let that cool to room temp. Then when I did my mash in I just scraped the pumpkin off the cookie sheet into the mash and stirred it up real well. I added about 3 large handfuls of rice hulls (probably close to 1/4lb). Used 5 gallons of strike water and strike temp was around 175, but I overshot my mash temp. I added about 2qts of cold water (from my water dispenser on the fridge) and it dropped the mash temp down to about 153. Was around 151-152 when I ended the mash. I sparged with around 4 gallons of water at 175, but I think should have used less I think. Had a little over 7 gallons in the BK and still had water standing over the top of the grain in the MLT.

Cool - thanks! I'm hoping to brew it this weekend. Will let you know how it goes.

DRog00 said:

I haven't made the recipe you have here, but I do make a mean pumpkin ale once a year. I use a boatload of pumpkin in the mash, about 4lbs. Bake it at 350 for 30-45 mins at 350. I also include about 1lb in the boil. Whatever you do, make sure you put 1-1.5lbs of rice hulls prior to mash, or it will stick and/or run slower than molasses in winter. It took me just over 2 hours to sparge my last 11 gallon batch with only 1.5lbs in the entire mash.

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What do you mean by rice hulls prior to mash?
Thanks

I'm brewing this either tonight or Monday. I bought .75lbs of rice hulls from the brew store and plan on adding them right before I add the grains and pumpkin to the mash. Supposed to help prevent stuck/slow sparge.

I'm hoping i didn't miss something because i used a recipe from another site and there was nothing about rice hulls. I'm slowly sparging right now and after all the comments i might move the spice up just a hair to maybe 2 tbps

I used rice hulls and still had a very slow/stuck sparge. Didn't use enough I guess. Rocking the mash tun (I have the round cooler type) back and forth worked. I haven't bottled yet so I can help you with the spice. What I tasted when I transferred to secondary was great and I did 1.5 tbs.

Yeah, sparge has taken a good 3 hours now, finally have enough in the pot to get things going. This is my second all grain and I think my patients are spent....... Note to self, don't start a brew so late in the afternoon when you have to work the next morning

This one took me a long time too. Hopefully you haven't been drinking the entire time. I did when I brewed this one and woke up with a headache and angry wife. I think this recipe might be worth it though.

Lol, nah I quit drinking an hour ago. 20 more minutes of boiling and my bed is calling me.

I finally kegged my batch last night so it was the first time I got to taste it. It might could have used a little more spice.. but all and all it tasted great! Of course as I put it into the keezer I learned that I apparently didnt clean the beer line for that keg when I pulled it out a couple months ago. Now I need to float one of my other kegs just so I can fill it with cleaner and easily clean my lines.. or build a beer line cleaner. This weekend I am brewing a Strawberry Wheat!

I brewed this recipe 2 nights ago with 64 oz canned pumpkin in the mash and no rice. I had a little bit of an issue with the mash itself but easily hit my volume with 5.5 gallons of spathe water. OG was 1.060, just a touch lower than expected. The pumpkin pie spice (I used Trader Joe's brand) comes through strong, but I didn't think it was overpowering. I'm hoping that itmellows a bit. Anyone have any thoughts on time in the primary and secondary?

I'm planning on bottling this weekend or early next week. That will be 10 days primary and 10-14 secondary. I'm impatient though. Then 2-4 weeks in the bottle. Need to get a keg system!

I think I was way to impatient, I may have shaken my tun a little hard. My sample came out a little grainy tasting with an OG of 1.072. Color looked good so hopefully when I transfer to the secondary it will clean up a little more

I didnt secondary mine.. but I rarely use a secondary these days. I left it in the primary for about a month.. was nice and clear. It will sit in the keg and condition for another month or so. I am hosting a Halloween party on the 27th and thats when it will get its grand debut.

I made this recipe (with a little extra pumpkin) about two months ago. Overall, I used 64 oz of canned pumpkin in the mash. I ended up using 1.5 Tbs Trader Joe's Pumpkin Pie spice and Sugar in the Raw for priming. I've already sampled at two weeks and have to say that it turned out quite nicely. The pumpkin pie spice is more subtle than I expected (which is a good thing), and it's best served at 50-55 F. Highly recommend this recipe if making an all-grain pumpkin ale

Update.. I had a DFH Punkin left over from last year so I cracked it open last night and did a "blind comparison" of the two. I must say.. very dang close! This will without a doubt become my annual pumpkin recipe!

This is a really old post but I a brewing this- this weekend....
I found the same recipe on another site and they didn't mention anything about baking the pumpkin on a cookie sheet prior to putting in the mash? Do I need to do this? What does it add for you?

Thanks

Baking it brings out the flavor of the pumpkin, you wouldn't want to eat a raw pumpkin pie would you

From watching the pumpkin ale episode of brew masters I can say that they do not roast the pumpkin before it goes in the mash. However, having just done a side by side tasting of this recipe and some bottles of punkin this recipe has more of a pumpkin note and I think that is due to the roasted pumpkin flesh.