Brewed this today and everything went surprisingly well. I have never brewed a a pumpkin beer before and after doing some reading I was concerned about a stuck sparge with the pumpkin in the mash. I added 1 pound of rice hulls to the mash and never looked back!! Vorlauf took a little longer then usual, but the mash tun drained like the pumpkin wasn't even there. This was also my first mash with a bazooka screen in the tun so that could have helped too. Smelled awesome going into the fermenter, I can't wait to try this one! Thanks for the recipe.
Autumn Seasonal Beer Punkin' Ale
- Thread starter Reno_eNVy
- Start date
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So I had a good and bad brew night. I fixed some efficiency issues I had on the last couple of batches and got back to 70% (BIAB), and hit my numbers. The bad news was that I forgot to add the pie spices to the boil. So I will have to do a tincture at kegging time. I have heard that spices done post boil will taste stronger, so I may need to scale down the amount of spices that I add. Has anyone here had any experience with that?
wvdad
Well-Known Member
Baking the pumpkin this evening along with a small yeast starter since I only have one package of 05 on hand. I love the smell of the pumpkin baking.
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Reno_eNVy
Well-Known Member
Brewed up a batch on Friday. That wort boiled delicious. The samples I took were great and they were still unfermented. Lets hope it tastes as good when it is ready, though I am not going to even taste it again until at least October.
Brewed this today. Hit my numbers and had a few mishaps. I hope this comes out pretty good.
Need to brew this tomorrow and only have 1 oz of hallertau for it. I have some Kent Golding or fuggle to replace the other ounce. If I used one of them for the 60 min addition, any preference? I also have perle, tettnang, and willamette. I don't know if it will make much of a difference since it is 60 min, but I want this to be as close as possible since I am going to be serving it at a beer fest and want it to be the best I can make it. I hope 6 weeks will be enough time to meld everything together!
bigmike99
Well-Known Member
Brewing this today. 2nd biab so fingers are crossed.
bigmike99
Well-Known Member
Brewday went nice and smooth. Ended right on with 1.065 OG. Cooled and just pitched both packs of us05. I have to tell you this is easily the best tasting wort I've tasted. Wow.
n240sxguy
Well-Known Member
I'm getting ready to brew this Monday morning. What's the best yeast out of S-04, S-05, and Nottingham?
Brewskii
Well-Known Member
Of those hops, the Tettenang or Perle is closest to Hallertau. The Tettenang is prob the best choice for flavor comparison. This is a spiced ale however so hop selection isn't really critical. Pro-rate your addition by alpha-acid and you'll be fine (I.e. 1oz of a 5% AA hop =0.5 oz of a 10% AA)D_Nyholm said:
n240sxguy said:
If you have a preference use whichever. They are all pretty close. S-04 and Notty are going to provide a slight tartness and , for me that would make the US-05 the best choice but it's really personal preference.
Reno may have better thoughts.
bigmike99
Well-Known Member
n240sxguy said:
IMO with the incredible flavor already in the wort sticking with something that's going to keep it as close to that flavor as possible is best.
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Reno_eNVy
Well-Known Member
From my experiences, S-05 and Notty give you a clean yeast profile when fermented cooler (low 60's) whereas S-04 is more bready like the Whitbread strains.
Personally I prefer the former two choices... allows everything else to shine through.
Personally I prefer the former two choices... allows everything else to shine through.
atimmerman88
Well-Known Member
Has anyone tossed in a couple oz of special B into this?
Planning on making this this weekend and thought it might be a nice addition as well as a bourbon soaked vanilla bean
Planning on making this this weekend and thought it might be a nice addition as well as a bourbon soaked vanilla bean
billym99
Well-Known Member
Made a batch this weekend, thanks for the recipe! Pretty much used exactly what you have although I used Northern Brewer for bittering, and only 9lbs of 2-row. Cooked the pumpkin for about 60 minutes. Didn't have rice hulls but went for it anyways... wasn't too bad. First running's came to a crawl with about 1/2 gallon to go, sparge wasn't too bad. Powerful pumpkin pie smell once the McCormick Spice was added, smells very appetizing. Fermenting with S-05. Excited to try in a couple of months.
bigmike99
Well-Known Member
Thank god for always using a blow off tube. This was bubbling like an animal and has actually ran up my blowoff tube about halfway. Have to fix that then I wonder if it will still be shooting bubbles.
Brewed this on Sunday and it sure smelled good. Ran into some problems though. I biab and the bag ripped with all the grains ( did a 10 gallon batch so almost 25 lbs of grain). As i lifted the bag out, 2-3 lbs of grain went into the wort. Spend 30 minutes dipping a strainer in getting all the grains out and lost quite a bit of wort doing so. Ended up with 10 gallons of 1.064 instead of the 11.5 I was shooting for. One fermenter sure has a lot of trub in it SL I am only going to able to keg about 8.5 gallons or so 
Brewed this on Sunday and it sure smelled good. Ran into some problems though. I biab and the bag ripped with all the grains ( did a 10 gallon batch so almost 25 lbs of grain). As i lifted the bag out, 2-3 lbs of grain went into the wort. Spend 30 minutes dipping a strainer in getting all the grains out and lost quite a bit of wort doing so. Ended up with 10 gallons of 1.064 instead of the 11.5 I was shooting for. One fermenter sure has a lot of trub in it SL I am only going to able to keg about 8.5 gallons or so
It happens. 8.5G is better than no beer. haha
I grew up in Sayville, off Lincoln. John O'Rourke. Graduated '93
Staying on topic, I brewed this recipe with a few tweaks this past Saturday. Kept the same grain bill. Swapped in Liberty for the hops and used Wyeast Thames Valley for the yeast. Also changed the spicing. 3/4tsp cinnamon, 1/4 tsp ginger, 1/4 tsp allspice, and about 1/16 tsp clove. Was a bit nervous smelling the spice blend. Just didn't seem right. Then I added it to the boil. Smelled amazing. I wanted to dive in.
I think I ended up a little low on volume. Maybe 5 gallons, when I was shooting for 5.5. OG was 1.069.
n240sxguy
Well-Known Member
I brewed this yesterday morning. I ended up boiling off more than I thought, so I added a gallon of distilled water to top off. I ended with about 11 gallons at 1.063. I used three packs of S-05. I rehydrated it at the recommendation of everyone. Oddly enough, this morning it was showing no signs of fermentation. I had it sitting at 58, so I bumped it up to 66 for the day to try to get it started. Usually when I just sprinkle the yeast on top I have activity by now. Should be fine though. Smells awesome. I used one of the little jars of pumpkin pie spice. I assume that's around 3Tbs. If anything it's a little less.
Small world! I swam with your brother Brian (if same family). Sayville class of '95 and my sister Danielle was class of 93. Just moved back to Sayville last year, this place a draw about it.
There are a bunch of brewers here, great place to live!
I hope my 8.5 gallons is enough though. Have to bring 5 gallons to a brew festival in October. First time serving at one and I hope it is good! Never brewed this recipe before and it was the only fall based beer that I had the ingredients for!
Different O'Rourkes, but I know Brian, they lived around the corner from us, and he was our paperboy. I knew your sister too. Too funny. Small world indeed.
Just moved my parents out to Moriches two weeks ago. My sister still lives in Sayville on Manton with her family.
Chris Kelley graduated from Sayville in '93 and is the LI Beer and Malt Enthusiasts. Not sure if it's the same club.
I've brewed with Chris before and his brother Gregg. I am going with them to the fest and brewing with that club. Great group of people!
bigmike99
Well-Known Member
This is still fermenting like crazy after pitching late Saturday night. Changed the blowoff and cleaned/sanitized everything and within 5 minutes we were bubbling again. I'm guessing the 1# of brown sugar and 2 packs of us05 will do it.
n240sxguy
Well-Known Member
I'm starting to get worried. No krausen after 30 hours. Is that common? Mine usually takes off by now.
atimmerman88
Well-Known Member
Seems like a lot of people have used vanilla extract or vanilla beans...
Any input as to a good amount of vanilla beans? I'd scrap and soak then add to primary after ferm has slowed.
1 or 2 beans ? Not looking for a vanilla beer, but a pumpkin beer with a hint of vanilla.
atimmerman88 said:
I have not added vanilla to this recipe but would think one would be max if you just want a hint. But even better would be soak a bean or two in vodka for a couple of weeks to infuse the flavour. Then you can dose in small amounts in the bottling bucket or keg until you hit the level you are happy with. You have complete control that way.
Any way you go I would be interested in the results. I thought of trying that myself but don't like to change more then one item at a time and for this go around I did a 50/50 split of two row and Maria otter.
n240sxguy
Well-Known Member
atimmerman88 said:
I didn't do vanilla in this beer, but I did just make a vanilla oatmeal porter. I soaked 8 Madagascar vanilla beans in 16 oz of vodka, and used 2 oz of it in my 10 gallon batch. I think it is wonderful. Not too much. Not too little. I would think with this beer I would add half that so it didn't over power the pumpkin spice.
