Autumn Seasonal Beer Punkin' Ale

[StoutNoDoubt]

Wow... Gravity ended up being 1.058. Efficiency took a nose dive due to a crazy stuck sparge. I noticed that if I use pie pumpkins and not the canned pumpkin my likelihood to get a stuck sparge goes way down. Today's brew day was damn near a nightmare....

 

[Reno_eNVy]

In response to anybody wanting to add the pumpkin to water and heat it before adding to the mash, this will help you get proper temperatures but it still won't help alleviate stuck mashes.

Stuck mashes can affect your gravities as well. If your mash is in the MLT longer than expected the temperatures will drop, giving you a drier beer. Just something to consider.

 

[Brew_G]

In response to anybody wanting to add the pumpkin to water and heat it before adding to the mash, this will help you get proper temperatures but it still won't help alleviate stuck mashes.

Stuck mashes can affect your gravities as well. If your mash is in the MLT longer than expected the temperatures will drop, giving you a drier beer. Just something to consider.

I BIAB, so I have less of issue with this, but here's another update on what I did. Hopefully it can help others.

I baked the pumpkin the day prior and popped it into the fridge overnight. While the strike water was coming to temp, I threw the pumpkin back into the oven to broil on high. I checked the temps occasionally until it came to about 180F, then I put it into a separate bag just a couple minutes prior to mashing in. By the time I was done mashing in, the temp of the pumpkin was pretty much spot on, so it didn't affect the mash temp when I dropped the bag into my mash/BIAB bag.

The nice thing about doing it this way was that I was able to keep the stringy bits of pumpkin out of the main bag, while allowing the other stuff to seep into the mash. It wasn't completely necessary for me to do this since I don't have any real worries about a stuck sparge with BIAB, but I wanted to be able to keep things somewhat tidy and ease the process of draining the bag.

 

[ScoobyKnows]

I baked the pumpkin an hour before I was ready to brew. Then I threw the pumpkin in with my strike water, stirred it in like crazy, and then heated to my desired temp just like I always do. I still added the rice hulls to the mash and had zero problems with my sparge. Pretty smooth brew day. Now the hard part...waiting.

 

[DagoBrewer]

Brewed this again last Tuesday. This beer is well worth brewing!

 

[mrtrav]

I brewed this one yesterday. Had a clogged sparge (not entirely stuck). Had to forego pumping from the MLT to the kettle and did a slow trickle via gravity. Hit all the gravity numbers right on and this beer is incredibly clear. Ridiculous how clear it is pre-fermentation. View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1441725138.525571.jpg

 

[TCollins]

I brewed this one yesterday. Had a clogged sparge (not entirely stuck). Had to forego pumping from the MLT to the kettle and did a slow trickle via gravity. Hit all the gravity numbers right on and this beer is incredibly clear. Ridiculous how clear it is pre-fermentation. View attachment 301935

That's super clear!!! Good on you for hitting all if your numbers.

 

[TCollins]

Looks beautiful Mrtrav!

 

[kenoglass]

Made this yesterday. Pitched the wlp 001 again and it's looking good. Got a little on the hot side overnight I hope it will be fine though. I am sure it will!! Can't wait to enjoy this one again!!!

 

[Rowdy50]

Transferred mine to secondary last night. OG was 1.050, and I'm not sure why. Hit my temps and times spot on. Maybe some measuring device isn't calibrated right. Added 2# light DME to bump OG to 1.065. FG last night was 1.006. Unexpected over-attenuation. Fermented about 75 degrees for 16 days. It tastes really good, so maybe I shouldn't care, but it would be nice to know what I'm doing wrong.

 

[Brew_G]

Transferred mine to secondary last night. OG was 1.050, and I'm not sure why. Hit my temps and times spot on. Maybe some measuring device isn't calibrated right. Added 2# light DME to bump OG to 1.065. FG last night was 1.006. Unexpected over-attenuation. Fermented about 75 degrees for 16 days. It tastes really good, so maybe I shouldn't care, but it would be nice to know what I'm doing wrong.

Did you check the calibration of your hydrometer?

I'm wondering if perhaps it's reading about .015 too low. If you came in that low and added DME to hit your expected gravity, though in reality your hydrometer was reading low, then you may have actually been at 1.080 after the DME addition. Assuming your FG of 1.006 was actually 1.021 (i.e. .015 higher than your hydrometer showed), the. That would have given you 72% attenuation, which is certainly feasible, especially with the DME addition.

I don't know if I'm right, but it's just a thought.

 

[ratinator]

A local brewery makes a fantastic pumpkin ale (Fort Garry) and they use nugget hops and use oak chips. Last year I used nugget and the chips with this recipe and had great results, very good. This year I'm doing pretty much everything the same but I'm out of S-05, and I had a some American Ale II 1272, so I'm going try a batch with that.

 

[Brew_G]

Had one bottle of this that I know had gotten infused with massive amounts of oxygen on bottling day, so I decided to test that one early. Today was the day.

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1441998621.226911.jpg

It's been 20 days since bottling, and I've had this in the fridge for three days. It definitely needed a little more time to carb up, so I'll be letting the rest of the batch do its thing for about another week, then I'll put a out half in the fridge to cold condition.

Color: Deep amber/orange. A little cloudy right now, but it'll likely clear up really nicely as it cold conditions.

Aroma: You definitely get the pumpkin spice up front, with a little sweet maltiness on the back side.

Flavor: this is packed with flavor! The spice takes on a more earthy note on the tongue right now, and it's got a really nice sweetness to it. That 1.017 FG really comes through. IBUs are at 21 for my recipe, and this is reflected in the really easy bitterness. I'm not sure how to pick out esters, but from my reading about them, I think they're limited to nonexistent in this beer.

Mouthfeel: Holy f'ing mouthfeel! Again, the higher FG does the trick on this, as this is a really full-feeling beer...almost to the point of slightly coating the tongue. Really smooth.

You can tell that this beer is really complex, but it's not confused. It's definitely got a nice little kick, though! I think that, given another 4-6 weeks in the bottle, this beer will be fantastic.

 

[Biscuits]

Since I did not add my spices during the boil, I just racked to secondary onto a spice tea of 1 cup water/1 tsp. pumpkin spice. It smelled amazing going in, I chose to forgo the brown sugar in this recipe as well because I wanted a more "natural pumpkin flavor", which I think I got....although, next time I will probably follow the recipe to the T.

 

[waltzbrewingco]

Just cracked on open. Definitely under carbed at only a week. That being said, the flavor is good, heavy pumpkin and the spices as mentioned in previous posts are rather earthy. Kind of complex and I'm not pulling a lot of individual aromas out with the lack of head.
What is the shortest amount of time anyone who has bottled had to wait for fill carbonation?

 

[TCollins]

Just bottled. Color and taste is on point.

View attachment 1442180069587.jpg

 

[jappler]

I'm hoping to brew this on Friday and have it ready for Halloween (so roughly 6 weeks out). Just had a question.

First time using rice hulls, they just get mixed in with the grain bill? Pumpkin goes into the mash tun before or after grain?

Thanks guys!

 

[dsaavedra]

I brewed this beer in September 2014 and I saved 12 of the beers for aging. I just cracked one open a few nights ago and it aged very well!

I overshot my gravity a little when I brewed it with DME and the beer ended up at 8% ABV. The bottles I drank fresh had a slight bite to them but after a year in bottles you would never know it was 8%. It mellowed out very nicely. Taste and aroma were very smooth and pleasant. The beer was crystal clear as well (it aged most of the year in my basement and has been in the fridge for the last few months). A nice vibrant, crystal clear, red-orange color.

Only negative thing I noticed was a lack of carbonation/head. I carbed it pretty low to begin with because I felt it was a style that didn't need a lot of carbonation. But it seemed as though it lost carbonation over the aging period. The carbonation was very subtle and there was zero head formation, even with a pretty vigorous pour. When it was fresh there was more carbonation/head formation. I think this may be due to my capper not being able to get as good of a seal on the stubby bottles I bottled this batch in. When I cap long-necks I get a nice circular imprint in the cap and a very tight seal (cap bends when I pry it off). On the stubby bottles I don't get the imprint no matter how much force I use when capping and the caps are easier to pry off. So my guess is a small amount of CO2 escaped from the bottles over the last year.

All in all the aged beer was excellent and I am thinking about brewing another batch of this (all grain this time) on Halloween and aging the whole batch (or most of it anyway) for next fall!

 

[mrtrav]

I'm hoping to brew this on Friday and have it ready for Halloween (so roughly 6 weeks out). Just had a question.

First time using rice hulls, they just get mixed in with the grain bill? Pumpkin goes into the mash tun before or after grain?

Thanks guys!

I mixed the hulls with the grain, doughed in, then added the pumpkin. My sparge was incredible slow, so not sure if this is the best method or not, but it didn't get completely stuck on my 10 gallon igloo cooler with a false bottom.

 

[ratinator]

I put the rice hulls on the top of my grain so it goes in first to hit the bottom and prevent sticking. Once I got my grain wet I add my pumpkin and give it a good mix. I usually mix the pumpkin is hot so the loss of heat is less and the pumpkin is easy to mix in

 

[mattsearle]

Apologies if this has been asked already but there's a lot of pages to this thread.

How will the pumpkin effect the OG i.e. what sugars may it contribute? I've got it in beersmith and my OG is at 1.065 as per the recipe, but this is without the pumpkin as I cannot add this (I don't think?) so I'm wondering if I'm going to end up with an OG of 1.080 or something if I make this recipe as per beersmith but with the pumpkin added to it?
Thanks

 

[55x11]

Apologies if this has been asked already but there's a lot of pages to this thread.

How will the pumpkin effect the OG i.e. what sugars may it contribute? I've got it in beersmith and my OG is at 1.065 as per the recipe, but this is without the pumpkin as I cannot add this (I don't think?) so I'm wondering if I'm going to end up with an OG of 1.080 or something if I make this recipe as per beersmith but with the pumpkin added to it?
Thanks

I have Libby Pumpkin in my beersmith, in adjunct "add" option, but I think it may have come from some additional file that I added with all sort of canned fruit.

The beersmith profile claims 1.005 SG points per 1 lb of pumpkin. (I have seen some people calculate as much as 1.008 SG points per 1 lb but it's still the same ballpark).
So if you are adding 1.8 lbs to 5 Gallon batch, you will raise SG by maybe .001-.002 (1 or 2 points). Mine went from 1.063 to 1.064 when I add the pumpkin. Bottom line - it will not be super-significant, unless you are one of those people who care about hitting their SG to within 0.1%

Most of pumpkin additions are for flavor/mouthfeel and contains very few fermentable sugars anyways.

See this thread for more details:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=199558

 

[joshesmusica]

I'm going to be brewing this tomorrow, and I feel like I read somewhere that people were baking the pumpkin at 200F for 2 hours, but it might not have been on this recipe. What are people baking this pumpkin at and for how long?

 

[Brew_G]

I'm going to be brewing this tomorrow, and I feel like I read somewhere that people were baking the pumpkin at 200F for 2 hours, but it might not have been on this recipe. What are people baking this pumpkin at and for how long?

I baked mine at 400F for one hour in a 15x10" Pyrex pan. I then covered it put it in the fridge for a couple days before broiling on high for maybe 10 minutes to bring it up to temp just before mash in.

 

[Nicegirl]

I'm going to be brewing this tomorrow, and I feel like I read somewhere that people were baking the pumpkin at 200F for 2 hours, but it might not have been on this recipe. What are people baking this pumpkin at and for how long?

I spread mine out on an insulated baking pan so it's about 3/4" thick. Bake it at 350° for 60 minutes. Let it cool to the same temperature as your strike water and add it in.

 

[mattsearle]

I have Libby Pumpkin in my beersmith, in adjunct "add" option, but I think it may have come from some additional file that I added with all sort of canned fruit.

The beersmith profile claims 1.005 SG points per 1 lb of pumpkin. (I have seen some people calculate as much as 1.008 SG points per 1 lb but it's still the same ballpark).
So if you are adding 1.8 lbs to 5 Gallon batch, you will raise SG by maybe .001-.002 (1 or 2 points). Mine went from 1.063 to 1.064 when I add the pumpkin. Bottom line - it will not be super-significant, unless you are one of those people who care about hitting their SG to within 0.1%

Most of pumpkin additions are for flavor/mouthfeel and contains very few fermentable sugars anyways.

See this thread for more details:

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=199558

Ideal that's exactly what I was after! I'm not worried about a couple points here and there so that's all good! Thanks

 

[jdman65]

Just a quick question about the extract recipe. When and how should I add the Libby's pumpkin? While steeping the grains or during the boil? Do you put it in a grain bag? Also for a full 5 gallon boil are you adding the LME all at once or doing a later addition for color?

 

[DrunkleJon]

Pretty much any method should work. May as well steep them. You do want to give the extraction some boil time to make sure all is sanitary.

 

[jdman65]

So steep them and take them out with my grains?

 

[jbb3]

I brewed this one yesterday. Had a clogged sparge (not entirely stuck). Had to forego pumping from the MLT to the kettle and did a slow trickle via gravity. Hit all the gravity numbers right on and this beer is incredibly clear. Ridiculous how clear it is pre-fermentation. View attachment 301935

That's one beautiful gravity sample.

Did you use the AG recipe on page 1 of this thread? Any changes??

I'm inspired!