"Pumpple Bee Cider" pumpkin pie test brew

[Justwingnit]

UPDATED Recipe see message #9

I'm a newbie at creating recipes so please help me tweak this attempt to make something that taste like pumpkin pie.
I was thinking with the time of year it is I wanted to try to make a Pumpkin Apple Cider. After a week of reviewing this web page for possible recipes and having had a lot of good luck with fresh honey, cinnamon, maple syrup, apple cider, using WLP775 yeast. I came up with this recipe.

Any advice or recommendations before I make it?
I like shooting for 10% abv.

Sand’Angelo’s
Pumpple Bee Cider 001

1 large pie pumpkin or about 2 cup of 100% pumpkin puree
1 large banana
1 large Orange
1/2 cup apple n spice instant oatmeal
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
3 tbsp cinnamon
10 whole cloves
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 LB of dark brown sugar +or- based on OG (looking for 1.075 to 1.080)
1 qt of fresh honey
4 gallon of apple juice / or apple cider (with no preservatives)
4 tsp of yeast nutrients
1 packet of White Labs WLP775 English Cider Yeast

Juice Pumpkin (No rind) Banana (no peel) and Orange (whole thing)
add Juice mix and 1/2 gallon (or so) apple juice with sugar and boil
after 45 min. of slow boil add all other dry ingredients and honey
let simmer about 15 more min then cool to room temp naturally.

mix everything into carboy and take a OG reading
Pitch yeast, and mix one more time

Primary until air lock activity slows about 10 days
Siphon into secondary (leaving bottom to wash yeast and reuse)
Ferment in secondary until gravity has stabilized for 3 consecutive days
Take FG reading and calculate approx. ABV. (looking for FG of 1.0 or less)

If needed back flavor at bottling to taste trying to keep maximum ABV.

Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[bucketnative]

It won't be subtle, that's for sure. Not sure I have any advice, but definitely give a full report of whatever you make and however it tastes!

 

[Justwingnit]

After 63 views I'm shocked that only one has given me any feedback positive or negative.
I was planning to make this tomorrow 9/23/18 afternoon and was wanting the more experienced crafters (of this forum) to talk to me about this recipe I created. Good, Bad, the ugly??

 

[Maylar]

Not my style, that's for sure. Far too many flavors in that. One or two things other than apple juice is all I ever do. If it tastes like poop you won't know why.

 

[S-Met]

Skip the brown sugar, you are adding 2lb of honey already.

Not sure about the banana.

Orange, zest only, dont add the peel unless you want to risk bittering.

Dont boil juice, take to 150 and let ingredients steep while it cools.

Temp control your fermentation if possible.

 

[bmd2k1]

Tons more stuff than I ever put in mine. I'm more of a KISS approach cider maker.

Cheers & Good luck [emoji111]

 

[madscientist451]

If the OP hasn't already combined the ingredients...
-Make a 1 quart starter with your English Cider yeast about 3 days before your cider making day.
-Make a plain base cider, don't heat it up, add Campden tablets 24+ before pitching yeast if desired.
-The base cider make take a few months to finish fermenting, the yeast to drop out and the flavor to mellow somewhat.
-To get a pumpkin pie type flavor, you'll have to stabilize and backsweeten the cider.
-Spices can be added by making a tincture with vodka, then do blending trials to find the flvor combination you are looking for.
-I've never fermented pumpkin, but I've heard that the resulting flavor isn't anything like pumpkin pie. If you still want to use it, I'd add it in secondary.
- An interesting experiment would be to split the base cider, add your pumpkin and spices to secondary to one half, and liquid pumpkin pie flavor to the other half:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0069P159A/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

 

[Justwingnit]

If the OP hasn't already combined the ingredients...
-Make a 1 quart starter with your English Cider yeast about 3 days before your cider making day.
-Make a plain base cider, don't heat it up, add Campden tablets 24+ before pitching yeast if desired.
-The base cider make take a few months to finish fermenting, the yeast to drop out and the flavor to mellow somewhat.
-To get a pumpkin pie type flavor, you'll have to stabilize and backsweeten the cider.
-Spices can be added by making a tincture with vodka, then do blending trials to find the flvor combination you are looking for.
-I've never fermented pumpkin, but I've heard that the resulting flavor isn't anything like pumpkin pie. If you still want to use it, I'd add it in secondary.
- An interesting experiment would be to split the base cider, add your pumpkin and spices to secondary to one half, and liquid pumpkin pie flavor to the other half:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0069P159A/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

Thank you for your input. I may have to try this option next time.

Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[Justwingnit]

UPDATE.... In Fermenter as of 9/24/18 7 AM Central time USA

Pumpple Bee Cider Recipe #002

The Actual Recipe I Used is....
4 Gallon Indian Summer Apple Cider (100% Juice, Not from Concentrate)
1 QT fresh Honey (about 2 Lb)
1 LB of dark brown sugar
2 cup fresh cut Pie Pumpkin (Juiced)
1 Large fresh Orange
1/4 tsp fresh orange zest
1/2 cup apple and cinnamon Quaker Oat's instant oatmeal (1 packet)
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp ginger
3 tbsp cinnamon
10 whole cloves
2 tbsp vanilla extract
4 tsp of yeast nutrients
1 packet of White Labs WLP775 English Cider Yeast

Cut fresh skinless pumpkin into 1 to 2 inch squares and put into juicer, add some Indian Summer cider and turn it into a puree (I ended up using 1 cup apple cider in my juicer, kept adding pumpkin until my puree was 3 cup)
Made fresh orange zest then juiced skinless orange and added orange juice it to me pumpkin puree
Put pumpkin/orange/cider puree, honey, brown sugar and one gallon cider into a pan, heat to 150 F for 30 minutes mixing often.
Add orange zest, oatmeal, nutmeg, ginger,cinnamon, vanilla, and cloves to the pot and mix well, cover and cool to room temp.
I use a plastic 5 Gallon Water Jug as my fermenter / carboy
Put remaining cider, and pan of pumpkin ext. into carboy, mix / shake and take a sample for OG reading.
add nutrients and yeast, install air lock and put into a temperature controlled environment (about 72 F 24/7)
OG 1.072 (possible some of the sugar is on bottom I'm thinking the OG should have been higher)

I'll update as it happens, but the test tube sample before adding yeast had a interesting taste.

Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[ApolloSimcoe]

Here is my .02. Skip the pumpkin all together or just use pure canned pumpkin for ease of use. Pumpkin is very bland and you aren't getting any flavors from it. If you use it in a pumpkin beer it just adds a little body to the beer and not much else. ALL of the flavor and aroma comes from the spices you are using.

1 large banana - not sure what you are thinking this will add and if you aren't certain, skip it. I have no input about fermenting a banana. Just keep in mind that it is from the rubber family and you could be creating something very odd.
1 large Orange -Just use the zest or buy dried orange peel
1/2 cup apple n spice instant oatmeal- what are you looking for here that you don't have in your spices below? If you are looking for body just go with plain oatmeal and adjust your spices. If you are looking to add apple flavors you can do that with real apples, lots of info out there on that
1/2 tsp nutmeg - good
1/2 tsp ginger -good
3 tbsp cinnamon - good but it seems like a lot to me but i'm not sure
10 whole cloves - this could be a lot too.
1 tbsp vanilla extract - good
1 LB of dark brown sugar +or- based on OG (looking for 1.075 to 1.080) - good
1 qt of fresh honey - good
4 gallon of apple juice / or apple cider (with no preservatives) - why not a 5G batch?
4 tsp of yeast nutrients - good
1 packet of White Labs WLP775 English Cider Yeast - check the attenuation on this can it handle the higher abv you are shooting for?

I would keep really good notes and adjust future batches on what comes out good and not so good.

Hope this helps!

 

[Justwingnit]

Here is my .02. ........ Hope this helps!

Thanks for your input!!!! This is how we all learn from each other!! My reply's in Red...

1 large banana - not sure what you are thinking this will add and if you aren't certain, skip it. I have no input about fermenting a banana. Just keep in mind that it is from the rubber family and you could be creating something very odd. Took it out but was thinking added nutrients but was part of me KISS make over to recipe.
1 large Orange -Just use the zest or buy dried orange peel Was wanting the added citrus flavoring, I did remove all the peel and added some fresh zest.
1/2 cup apple n spice instant oatmeal- what are you looking for here that you don't have in your spices below? If you are looking for body just go with plain oatmeal and adjust your spices. If you are looking to add apple flavors you can do that with real apples, lots of info out there on that Ok you got me... I have no idea except when I create a recipe I take 4 or more that I find on this and other forums and creat my own from them and two had oat meal in them so I added it to mine. LOL
1/2 tsp nutmeg - good
1/2 tsp ginger -good
3 tbsp cinnamon - good but it seems like a lot to me but i'm not sure, I have used cinnamon in 9 batches of cider and keep upping the amount and to this day have not regretted it.
10 whole cloves - this could be a lot too. The recipe that had this in it got lots of negative comments on amount too but he went with it and so did I.
1 tbsp vanilla extract - good I at last minuet I bumped this to 2 tbsp I hope i don't regret that move.
1 LB of dark brown sugar +or- based on OG (looking for 1.075 to 1.080) - good
1 qt of fresh honey - good
4 gallon of apple juice / or apple cider (with no preservatives) - why not a 5G batch? I use water jugs that only hold 5 gl and I need some head space or a blow off tube.
4 tsp of yeast nutrients - good
1 packet of White Labs WLP775 English Cider Yeast - check the attenuation on this can it handle the higher abv you are shooting for? this is the primary yeast I have been using for all the 7 batches of apple cider that I have made and it has brought me up to 12% abv

I would keep really good notes and adjust future batches on what comes out good and not so good. I have all the notes I can think of in a book and I'm documenting it in this thread so YEP. Thanks a mill, I do Love when I get feedback like yours, this is how we all learn, talking and trying...

Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[ApolloSimcoe]

Sounds good! I looked up that yeast and looks like it will do a great job. You mentioned how you kept upping the cinnamon, this just shows that i had no idea how much was too much but for me i like all those flavors to be in the backround/subtle.

You may be right on the vanilla.

Have you thought of oaking this? 1-2 oz oak soaked in Rum could do something nice

 

[Maylar]

Just as another FYI, powdered spices don't work very well. They don't dissolve, they just float on top and they're tough to filter out. We use whole spices, like cinnamon sticks and chunks of whole nutmeg instead. And vanilla extract can be fake - better to use whole beans split and seeded.

 

[Justwingnit]

Have you thought of oaking this? 1-2 oz oak soaked in Rum could do something nice

Yes I have thought about it, actually thought about it for a few batches now, but never tried it, I was reading about it and when
I secondary my batches I drop them to 1 gallon clear jugs and try different things with each jug so I may drop some oak chips into one, I was wondering if anyone had ever tried apple chips.

Just as another FYI, powdered spices don't work very well. They don't dissolve, they just float on top and they're tough to filter out. We use whole spices, like cinnamon sticks and chunks of whole nutmeg instead. And vanilla extract can be fake - better to use whole beans split and seeded.

You know I have seen my (probably) Cinnamon floating on other batches of cider I have made but not on my first few batches and after the first few I switched from sticks to powder. Interesting I never caught that. as for vanilla yes I did know that and I made sure it was 100% from vanilla bean.

This is great, I'm loving all this talk.

Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[Justwingnit]

Skip the brown sugar, you are adding 2lb of honey already.

Not sure about the banana.

Orange, zest only, dont add the peel unless you want to risk bittering.

Dont boil juice, take to 150 and let ingredients steep while it cools.

Temp control your fermentation if possible.

when you say temp control the fermenter if possible, what temp u recomend.

 

[S-Met]

Low end of your yeast. Ciders are very aromatic, much more so than beer. Too aggressive of a fermentation can blow off the delicate flavors of your cider leaving it tasting flat. If temp control is an option, use it.

 

[ApolloSimcoe]

Right now mine is at 66 degrees, using US-05

 

[Justwingnit]

Oh... i may b in trouble then, it is in the coolest room of my house and the temp is about 85 right now, gets alot cooler at night but daytime high is still kicking it up to mid 80's
I used White Labs 775 and it's specks are from web page ....
WLP 775 English Cider Yeast
Attenuation: 80.00-100.00
Flocculation: Medium
Alcohol Tolerance: Medium - High (8 - 12%)
Optimum Fermentation Temperature: 68.00-75.00

so I'm running about 10 f higher than Optimum Fermentation Temp.
I'm trying to cool the room / house down without upsetting the wife.

Should I put it in an ice bath in a large bucket or bath tub??

 

[ApolloSimcoe]

your ambient air temp is in the mid 80's. Once fermentation really kicks in the juice will be much higher than the surrounding air temps. There are many ways to keep that temp down without a Ferm Chamber. Just do some quick looks online and you'll find something that may work for you

 

[Maylar]

Oh... i may b in trouble then, it is in the coolest room of my house and the temp is about 85 right now, gets alot cooler at night but daytime high is still kicking it up to mid 80's
I used White Labs 775 and it's specks are from web page ....
WLP 775 English Cider Yeast
Attenuation: 80.00-100.00
Flocculation: Medium
Alcohol Tolerance: Medium - High (8 - 12%)
Optimum Fermentation Temperature: 68.00-75.00

so I'm running about 10 f higher than Optimum Fermentation Temp.
I'm trying to cool the room / house down without upsetting the wife.

Should I put it in an ice bath in a large bucket or bath tub??

10° above the recommended max is a lot. Most yeasts will create fusel alcohols that may or may not age out. And WLP-775 is notorious for making sulfur (rhino farts) that are considered normal, but at elevated temp it'll likely be much worse. Get it down however you can.

Your recipe is a funky experiment to begin with with all those additions, it'd be a shame to make something icky because you stressed the yeast.

 

[Justwingnit]

10° above the recommended max is a lot. Most yeasts will create fusel alcohols that may or may not age out. And WLP-775 is notorious for making sulfur (rhino farts) that are considered normal, but at elevated temp it'll likely be much worse. Get it down however you can.

Your recipe is a funky experiment to begin with with all those additions, it'd be a shame to make something icky because you stressed the yeast.

About 12 hours ago, I moved the carboy into a refrigerator that was almost empty (and turned it up all the way to almost off) as a temporary solution for the over heating problem. It just temped out at 75 f so I's at least down to the high side of the range.

Meanwhile I'm modifying a small refrigerator to be able to hold my carboy so it can be a temperature controlled fermentation container......

Update.. see https://www.homebrewtalk.com/forum/...entation-container-from-a-mini-fridge.656221/

 

[Scientific hippie]

- An interesting experiment would be to split the base cider, add your pumpkin and spices to secondary to one half, and liquid pumpkin pie flavor to the other half:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0069P159A/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20[/QUOTE]

I love pumpkin spice, bu hubby doesn't. I just ordered the above extract; now I can make 1/2 gallon plain apple and 1/2 gallon pumpkin spice. Another experiment!

 

[Scientific hippie]

- An interesting experiment would be to split the base cider, add your pumpkin and spices to secondary to one half, and liquid pumpkin pie flavor to the other half:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0069P159A/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

I love pumpkin spice, bu hubby doesn't. I just ordered the above extract; now I can make 1/2 gallon plain apple and 1/2 gallon pumpkin spice. Another experiment![/QUOTE]


At Trader Joes, I found pre-spiced cider. Now I have two gallons going; both just apple juice, one to be spiced and one not. A third gallon is the pre-spiced; i didn't add the pectinase. We''ll see what happens...

 

[Scientific hippie]

Of course, hubby now reminds me that he likes the spice; he just doesn't like pumpkin!

 

[Justwingnit]

update:
Pulled a sample today, sg down from 1.072 to 1.008 making it 8.4 ABV the air lock has a great smell, sample has a ok smell, visually it's is the cloudy the most I have ever seen, taste not bad, taste better after running it threw a cheesecloth and better yet with a pinch of honey. I'm going to let the yeast keep working I'll check the sg again in a few days.

When I rack to secondary I'm thinking racking whole batch into one carboy to let it have a chance for some major fall out. Then after it clears some racking threw cheesecloth into gallon jugs and experimenting with different ways of back flavoring.

- An interesting experiment would be to split the base cider, add your pumpkin and spices to secondary to one half, and liquid pumpkin pie flavor to the other half:
https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0069P159A/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

[/QUOTE]

Yes this is one of the experiments i'm thinking of doing.



Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[Justwingnit]

was thinking about this label

 

[Justwingnit]

this morning makes 9 days in fermentation and it has reached my target ABV of 10% so I lowered the temp on my mini fridge to 34f I know it will most likely never get to 34f but the control box will not turn off unless it does get that low.

Taste and smell is ok at best, and all the crap is floating in my product too. After a few days of "cold crashing" I'll transfer it to a secondary running it threw a cheesecloth.

Now to think about back flavoring. I ordered

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0069P159A/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

and plan on trying that and I have a friend that is "Executive Chef" that has given me a puree recipe that his restaurant uses in a latte that I will try too.

So what I have learned so fare is next time fallow

Tons more stuff than I ever put in mine. I'm more of a KISS approach cider maker.[emoji111]

and / or

If the OP hasn't already combined the ingredients.......-To get a pumpkin pie type flavor, you'll have to stabilize and backsweeten the cider........-I've never fermented pumpkin, but I've heard that the resulting flavor isn't anything like pumpkin pie. If you still want to use it, I'd add it in secondary.

so what I'm saying is I'm going back to making a GREAT basic hard cider and if I want to add flavors like this pumpkin test, I'll work on doing it in the secondary and / or at bottling.

Bottom line anyone with experience with back flavoring please chime in and give me your recommendations.

Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[ApolloSimcoe]

My experience with back flavoring has always been to blend the flavors on bottling day. Blend-taste-blend-taste as needed till you get it where you want it then bottle. You can make up a tincture with vodka and spices, flavoring etc

 

[Justwingnit]

My experience with back flavoring has always been to blend the flavors on bottling day. Blend-taste-blend-taste as needed till you get it where you want it then bottle. You can make up a tincture with vodka and spices, flavoring etc

LOL my only problem with that is (as I stated above) it's at 10% ABV if I blend and taste that much and add some vodka on bottling day the taste may be influenced by the ABV and I may not have anything left to bottle. LOL But in reality your recommendation is exactly what I have done in the past with good to excellent results.

thanks for your post.

Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[ApolloSimcoe]

you must pull off a pretty health "sample"

 

[Scientific hippie]

you must pull off a pretty health "sample"

My flavoring arrived today; the ciders have a ways to go. I am distracting myself with freshly made 3-day mead and kombucha. I just started a batch of Bray's 3-day mead (aka "the BOMM"); it was a real workout getting 2.5 lbs of honey to dissolve in under a gallon of water!

 

[Scientific hippie]

My flavoring arrived today; the ciders have a ways to go. I am distracting myself with freshly made 3-day mead and kombucha. I just started a batch of Bray's 3-day mead (aka "the BOMM"); it was a real workout getting 2.5 lbs of honey to dissolve in under a gallon of water!

Oops! I meant Bray's one-month mead (aka "the BOMM.") It's an interesting recipe, very exact. You start with a gallon of spring water, pour off a certain amount, pour it into your vessel, and mark the water level. Then you pour off an additional amount of water and mark that lower level. I may be a scientist, but physical chem was never my strong suit. As I labored to get the honey to dissolve in the water, the level kept lowering and I kept adding more honey. Then, at some point, the volume increased and the level is above the upper line! Chemists, help me out!

 

[Justwingnit]

Oops! I meant Bray's one-month mead (aka "the BOMM.") It's an interesting recipe, very exact. You start with a gallon of spring water, pour off a certain amount, pour it into your vessel, and mark the water level. Then you pour off an additional amount of water and mark that lower level. I may be a scientist, but physical chem was never my strong suit. As I labored to get the honey to dissolve in the water, the level kept lowering and I kept adding more honey. Then, at some point, the volume increased and the level is above the upper line! Chemists, help me out!

it is still young its only been 12 days after pitching yeast but i have more information for anyone following this thread. i made a puree that taste great and i got some of the prior mentioned flavoring too, i actually did a great job with the puree, vanilla, and splenda but it seperates even after putting the mix into a glass. the flavoring on the other hand is a liquid and i think it turned out great and it dont seperate, for now the batch is in secondarily it has some extras in it too. after i fine tune the flavoring and i bottle it I'll repost exact recipe and procedure heare and in cider recipe forum.

Larry
Toxic Cellar

 

[Justwingnit]

Today was bottling day, it's been 26 days now, I racked it to a bottling bucket at 20 days and put 10 sticks of cinnamon in it and some sobrante, it finished out at about 10.33% abv. I had a little under 3 gallon left after all the Lee's dropped out and tracking and sampling. I Back flavored 3/4 gallon and racked the other two gallons into gallon jugs.
Back flavoring turned out great, I'll let you know what friends think of it.
Recipe for flavoring...
3/4 gallon of 10.33 abv cider, 1/4 gallon base cider (unfermented) dropping abv to 7.75% abv, added 8 tsp splenda, 16 tsp fresh honey, 2 tsp real liquid vanilla, 4 tsp of pumpkin extract (link given earlier in this thread) mix and bottle. I'm thinking it needs a little more pumpkin extract, but so far this is the best tasting stuff I have ever made (according to a sampler that has tried every batch I have made)

I still have two gallons to play with so look for an update from me when i play with it. I'm thinking at 6 months and again at a year.

 

[Justwingnit]

It may never clear. But it is good.