Recommendations for secondary additions...

[DarkUncle]

I just racked my pumkin ale over to the secondary after 3 weeks in the primary. I dropped a couple cinnammon sticks into the secondary. Can I, or should I, add anything else to help aid the flavors? I took a sample as it was racking over and got a perfect gravity reading. Right on the money. I then took a taste.

It tasted a bit like a pumkin ale. It definitely had a bite to it, to be expected I suppose. But it tasted like it was missing...something. This was a kit from Midwest Supplies. Added 3 cans of baked pumkin along with the included cinnammon/nutmeg packet while brewing.

It definitely needed more cinnammon which is why I dropped a couple sticks into the secondary. Only other way I can describe it is that it didn't taste as sweet as a typical pumpkin ale does which surprised me because of the addition of a pack of brown sugar to the brewpot that came with the kit. It also seemed a bit on the dry side.

Perhaps this will all change in the secondary and in the bottle? Not sure.

Any advice with this batch?

Thanks,
Chris

 

[Teaman]

You can add some pumpkin pie spice. Get it from the grocer. It's easy to find. I just made my first pumpkin ale and it is in the secondary. The recipe I did called for the spice but it was during the boil, so I don't know if you could put it in the secondary, but I don't see why not. If you do decide to then add 1-2 tsp.

 

[nikkormat]

nutmeg is also a big part of the 'pumpkin spice,' you think about adding some fresh ground?

 

[DarkUncle]

Well I added the nutmeg and ground cinnammon during the last 5-10 minutes of the boil. It just seems the taste really just isn't there. I have pumkin spice in the closet so perhaps I will indeed drop in 2 tsp of that as well.

 

[Trid]

we created pumpkin all as well and the flavors in the fermenter were bland as well. but its been bottled for 3 weeks now and allot of the spice developed nicely after bottling. expectingly in the head of the beer. at least from my experience bottle it and let it sit and it will all meld together.

 

[DarkUncle]

Yeah, bland is a good word to describe the taste. I will drop that pumkin spice in later and let it sit in the secondary to do it's thing.

Which is another good question. How long does it need to sit in the secondary before bottling? Keep in mind it was in the primary for just over 3 weeks.

Thanks again

 

[DarkUncle]

Just giving this a bump to see how long I should leave this in the secondary before bottling. I need this to be drinkable by Thanksgiving so I'm hoping the 3 weeks in primary and 1-2 weeks in secondary is all I need.

As a side point, I only dropped in 3 small cinnammon sticks and will be adding the 2 tsps of pumkin spice tonight. Is this all good without making it too overpowering?

 

[Teaman]

Everytime I add spices and or flavorings I never seem to add enough and undershoot on the flavor, so I say go for it and see.
I have mine in the secondary longer than the primary to try and get all the debris to settle out. I don't know about yours but I had a bunch of pumpkin leftovers on the bottom of my primary and that was after filtering it going into the primary. Can you see that on the bottom of yours?? When I racked it to the secondary I was way under 5 gallons. I'm hitting about 1 week in primary and 3 weeks in secondary.

 

[edie]

worry about sanitizing when adding things to the secondary?

 

[DarkUncle]

Oh yeah. I had a thick layer of crud on the bottom of the primary. Right now the beer is in the secondary and definitely is a bit cloudy. I'm thinking I will leave it in the secondary for 2 weeks total but during the final 3 days I will cold crash it down to around 35 degrees. Hopefully that will clear it up.

As far as sanitizing goes, I did dunk the cinnammon sticks in the starsan before dropping them in. But the 2 tsps of pumpkin spice powder I just sprinkled right in. I actually don't remember ever reading anything about sanitizing any secondary additions.