Midwest pumpkin ale I'm confused by og

Hi folks . I was looking at the Midwest all grain pumpkin ale kit. I was thinking of making a half batch of it because I have all the goodies here on hand.

The Midwest instructions sheet says starting gravity is about 1.045 or so. I took their recipe cut it right in half and the brewers friend software online give 1.056 or so.


http://www.midwestsupplies.com/pumpkin-ale-all-grain-kit.html

I'm confused...
I cut their recipe right in half and their recipe calls for 9 pounds of 2 row . eight ounces of caramel10 eight ounces of carapil . That's didn't jive with a 1.045

What am I missing?

 

I'm somewhat of a noob brewer myself so talk this with a grain of salt, but did you properly adjust for boil off? Assuming you are doing a full volume boil I believe if you simply cut the water in half along with the rest of the recipe you will end up with a higher % boil off (water evaporated during the boil) which will leave you with less than half the volume you were expecting and a higher og. Adding more water, pre or post boil, to get the correct volume should bring the OG in line with the estimated value for the full batch.

Like I said, take that with a grain of salt but that's where I would start.

 

I have done around 15 at batches. My boil off rate it 7/8 gallon in one full hour. Consistently. I rarely have to add top up water... Occasionally ten to 15 ounces.

I'm just confused on why their literature states 1.45 ish. I have ran it thru several calculators. They all say 1.05 ish. .

I did not brew this batch yet. I was just looking at the recipe.

 

If I brewed it and it was toooo high I would just add top up water


Can you run their recipe and tell me what you get

 

I just plugged it into my software and assumed it's a 5 gallon batch at 75% efficiency. I came up with an OG of 1.064. I zoomed in on the picture of the pumpkin ale kit and it says OG is 1.068 if I'm reading that right...not sure why your instructions would say 1.045...

edit: Maybe I'm reading it wrong. I see that they list potential alcohol as 4.8%. Something seems off.

 

Yep if you look on the directions sheet the of says around 1.042 to 1.04 . It's in red text a PDF.

I don't think Midwest would sell a 6% abv beer kit for $20

I'm going to do this beer, use brewers friend to figure out a grain bill that will give me 5% abv

Thanks for running it thru your software.

 

Sorry, I see it now. Also their website says 1 pound of brown sugar, but on the instructions and box it says 8oz. Plugging that in I'm getting 1.056

Strange. I guess just go for it and see what happens. Good luck with it

 

Yeah. No worries. I read the reviews and some guys got very high of but the beer still came out good. Think I'm going to make the higher version and see what happens!

 

Brewed a Pumpkin ale from midwest supplies, last Sunday, Oct. 5th, 2014.

Steeped grains at 155F for 30 minutes
Boiled malt extract, brown sugar, 1oz mt. hood hops for 60 minutes
Pumpkin for 5 minutes
1 oz cascade hops and spices for 2 minutes
Cooled to 70F within 15 minutes.
Glass carboy, 1.054 OG

 

I have about 8 pounds of two row and the crystal 10 and lots of liberty hops so I think I'm going to do a three gallon batch... Maybe with five pounds of two row