Imperial Pumpkin Ale recipe critique

[MrNic]

Recipe Type: Partial Mash
Yeast: Nottingham
Yeast Starter: No
Batch Size (Gallons): 5
Original Gravity: 1.071
Final Gravity: 1.015
IBU: 25
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
Color: 12
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 30 days
Secondary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): none

3.5# Briess Golden Light DME
3.5# 6-Row
1# Caramel 60
1# Biscuit Malt
.5# Flaked Wheat
.5# Brown Sugar
60.00 oz Pumpkin, Canned (Baked for 1 hour at 350 and mashed with grains)

1 oz Kent Goldings (7.2% AA 60.0 min)

1 tsp allspice (5 min)
1 tsp cinnamon (5 min)
.5 tsp nutmeg (5 min)
.5 tsp clove (5 min)


The first question I have is will I have enough room to mash in my 4 gallon pot? I know the grains and water will fit, but I'm concerned about the room the pumpkin will take up. Also, how do my spice amounts look? Any advice on mash temps? I'm basically going for pumpkin pie in a glass. Thanks in advance.

 

[beerandloathinginaustin]

I'm thinking you might be pushing it with all that pumpkin in a 4 gallon pot but beyond that all I have to offer is general well wishing. Any reason you're not adding the pumpkin in the secondary? Everything I've read lately says if you want the most flavor out of your fruit etc, you should go with secondary.

 

[heeler]

I'm thinking you might be pushing it with all that pumpkin in a 4 gallon pot but beyond that all I have to offer is general well wishing. Any reason you're not adding the pumpkin in the secondary? Everything I've read lately says if you want the most flavor out of your fruit etc, you should go with secondary.

I've read that you get NO REAL flavors from the meat of the pumpkin. It's all the spices that you add (pump pie spice mix). If you add the same spice mix to egg plant Would it still taste like egg plant?????
Now, nobody wants eggplant beer but you see what I'm getting at.
Has anybody done it both ways and noticed a BIG difference???

 

[MrNic]

I think what I might do is just bake both cans of pumpkin and then add pumpkin to the mash until I can't fit any more in. Like heeler said, you don't really get much pumpkin flavor, it's all about the spices. But it just seems weird brewing a pumpkin ale without any pumpkin at all, so that's why I'm gonna add some to the mash.

 

[MrNic]

Any suggestions anyone?

 

[sagnew440]

The grain and water (with 1.25qt) will take up roughly 2.36 gal, so you should be able to fit the pumpkin in there. I will let you know with that much pumpkin to grain it will be a very sticky mash. How do you normally sparge?

 

[MrNic]

This will be my first partial mash, but my plan is to set the grains on a strainer and sparge with about a gallon (or more depending on how much I'll need to get a total of 3.5 gallons) of 170 degree water.

 

[sagnew440]

I would allmost recommed using a paint strainer bag so you could squeeze the sparge water out of the mash if it doesn't want to flow. Like I said it will be verr sticky/gummy with that much pumpkin to grain.

 

[MrNic]

I'll be using a big grain bag. Maybe I'll cut it down to 30 oz of pumpkin.

 

[onipar]

I recently read something that said the tiny bit pumpkin adds to your SG is negligible, and that you can pretty much get away with adding it to the boil. Doing it that way of course means you'd have to try straining it since it wouldn't be strained during the mash. Here's the article (note that it was written in 2007):

http://www.audioholics.com/news/edi...e-brew-recipe-and-commercial-microbrew-recipe

All in all, I've seen every conceivable opinion on the addition of pumpkin. Some swear you don't need it, others say you have to mash it, others tell you to bake it first, others don't bake it, canned versus fresh, etc etc. In other words, you probably won't truly know what works best until you've tried these things for yourself.

You said you're going for "Pumpkin Pie in a cup." I read a couple recipes with the addition of lactose to add sweetness and more of that "pie" flavor. Whether or not it works, I don't know.

I haven't actually brewed my own Pumpkin Ale, but I am in the midst of writing a partial mash recipe, which is where all this info is coming from. :rockin:

 

[MrNic]

Interesting. Well, I know I want to use pumpkin in the mash, my question was how much room the pumpkin will take up since I only have 4 gallons to work with. I might add some lactose now that you mention it. Any suggestions on how much lactose to add?

 

[onipar]

Interesting. Well, I know I want to use pumpkin in the mash, my question was how much room the pumpkin will take up since I only have 4 gallons to work with. I might add some lactose now that you mention it. Any suggestions on how much lactose to add?

Again, this is strictly something I read (I've never actually worked with lactose, so others may be better suited answering this), but they said .5 to 1 pound of lactose. I guess it would largely be based on how sweet you want it.

 

[MrNic]

I just ordered the ingredients for this and I'll be brewing it asap. I changed the recipe a little bit, here it is:

Recipe Type: Partial Mash
Yeast: Nottingham
Yeast Starter: No
Batch Size (Gallons): 5
Original Gravity: 1.070
Final Gravity: 1.014
IBU: 23
Boiling Time (Minutes): 60
Color: 13
Primary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): 30 days
Secondary Fermentation (# of Days & Temp): none

3lb Briess Golden Light DME (late addition @ 15 min)
3lb 8oz 6-Row
1lb 6oz Caramel 60
11oz Biscuit Malt
11oz Flaked Wheat
8oz Brown Sugar (about 1 cup firmly packed)

29.00 oz Pumpkin, Canned (Baked for 1 hour at 350 and mashed with grains)

1 oz Kent Goldings (7.2% AA 60.0 min)

1.25 tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice @ Flameout
1.25 tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice added to primary after fermentation has finished.

Mash @ 154 for 60 minutes.
Sparge with 170 degree water.

Wish me luck!

 

[onipar]

Sounds really good! The ingredients for my Moon Hill Pumpkin Ale are on the way too. Looks like we'll be brewing about the same time. Good luck; let us know how it comes!

I'm going to post my finished recipe along with brewing/fermenting/tasting notes in the recipe database section (for vegetable/spice beers) once I brew.

 

[MrNic]

I'll definitely give tasting notes once it's ready. I'll probably sample it after 3 weeks of bottle conditioning and then every week after.

 

[MrNic]

I brewed this up on the 1st. I didn't quite hit my mash temp, so it ended up mashing at about 150 the whole hour. I was pretty happy though, I ended up getting 73% efficiency, which was way better than I was expecting. Last night I added more pumpkin spice. After tasting it a couple of times, I decided it needed some vanilla extract, so I added some of that last night as well.

 

[MrNic]

I bottled this today. I added a little more vanilla at bottling (1.5 TBSP total). I can't wait to taste it when it's all carbed up.

 

[PPrahme]

I bottled this today. I added a little more vanilla at bottling (1.5 TBSP total). I can't wait to taste it when it's all carbed up.

did you guys finish brewing these beers..they sound fairly close to my recipe and i was interested in how they turned out..

 

[MrNic]

did you guys finish brewing these beers..they sound fairly close to my recipe and i was interested in how they turned out..

It still needs to condition a little longer. It's not quite ready yet.