Pumpkin Ale... Help

[BigMooseBrewing]

Alright, boys. This is my first pumpkin ale. I made it for my fiance because she loves the ole' pumpkin spice around this time of year. I purchased the morebeer.com recipe kit for all-grain brewing x2 and made a 10-gallon batch. Now, I double everything and input the recipe into Brewfather to help me track my numbers. OG came out around 1.05, and brew day was very smooth. The temps held as stated in the recipe, and nothing seemed off at all.

Fast-forward three weeks. The fermentation started out smooth, with excellent temperature control, no issues, and steady. After about a week, the fermentation stopped at around 1.018, which, to me, seems a bit high. I tried rousing the fermentor, giving it some heat, and pitching a starter x2. Nothing is restarting this girl. Im wondering why I am stopping at such a high gravity, but Brewfather states my FG should be around 1.008. I sampled the beer; truthfully, it's not bad for a pumpkin ale. But as a perfectionist, I am trying to figure out what happened and whether the calculations are off or I messed up somewhere. Any ideas? Morebeer.com doesn't offer any FG for their recipes, and I am not sure if maybe the pumpkin spice is affecting the gravity.

Here are some screenshots of my stuffs. FYI there is no actual pumpkin in this recipe its a pumpkin spiced ale.

 

[rburrelli]

Final gravities in software are an estimate based upon the rang e of the yeast chosen. Based upon what you have done so far, I believe you have fermented as far as you can go with this one.

 

[mashdar]

Are you taking a hydrometer reading? Tilts are notorously bad at FG readings.

 

[BigMooseBrewing]

Are you taking a hydrometer reading? Tilts are notorously bad at FG readings.

Yes it’s the same

 

[mashdar]

Could the mash temp have been way high somehow? Calibration issue? Maybe mash-in overshot?

What was mash temp/timing? (I assume recipe wasn't 160F or something.)

Was there plenty of high DP malt? (pale?)

edit: Is it the Thanksgiving Pumpkin Ale?

 

[BigMooseBrewing]

Could the mash temp have been way high somehow? Calibration issue? Maybe mash-in overshot?

What was mash temp/timing? (I assume recipe wasn't 160F or something.)

Was there plenty of high DP malt? (pale?)

edit: Is it the Thanksgiving Pumpkin Ale?

I don't think so unless something is seriously off with my hot side system. I have a 20g Spike Solo modified with a false bottom and BIAB step-up.

Yes, this is Thanksgiving Pumpkin Ale. So, if you look at the recipe on the website, it is technically x2 because it's a 10g batch vs 5g.

 

[mashdar]

Hmm that's a real stumper. US-05?

edit: saw cellar science cali in there. I actually don't know if thats a US-05 clone or something else. But probably not 60% attenuating!

I agree with rburrelli that it sounds like it's done.

If not temp issues, maybe something was wrong with that batch of grain. Maybe check with an external thermometer on next mash just in case.

 

[BigMooseBrewing]

Hmm that's a real stumper. US-05?

So, I started with Cellar Science Cali. I added US-05 to see if maybe it missed one of the sugars and nothing.

 

[mashdar]

There was another similar thread recently where someone use amylase enzyme to drop the FG, if you're finding it too sweet:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/looking-for-help-identifying-why-fg-is-10-points-high.733883/

 

[BigMooseBrewing]

There was another similar thread recently where someone use amylase enzyme to drop the FG, if you're finding it too sweet:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/looking-for-help-identifying-why-fg-is-10-points-high.733883/

Yeah, I have heard some talk about this, but I have not tried it yet on any of my brews. The beer itself is not horribly sweet, and for a pumpkin ale, it's tolerable, but I just wanted to see if anyone can think of something I may have missed.