Autumn Seasonal Beer Samhain Pumpkin Ale

[nate201]

I brewed mine on sept 4 give or take a couple days. Tasted it today and I thought it had the spices just right. Not over powering like some of the pumpkin ales from the store and not underspiced like some have been saying. I will followed the recipe and used the dennys yeast.

 

[CraigT]

this may have been answered before but with toasting the marris otter, does it matter whether the grains have been crushed already?

 

[KingBrianI]

this may have been answered before but with toasting the marris otter, does it matter whether the grains have been crushed already?

Toast them before crushing.

 

[CraigT]

i guess i might have to skip this step then since i have no way of crushing them.

 

[bottlebomber]

i guess i might have to skip this step then since i have no way of crushing them.

Got a food processor or blender? That will get you by for this. I had to use it for the torrified wheat as that came to me uncrushed. Just pulse it till it resembles what you would normally work with

 

[KingBrianI]

With a small amount like that you can even throw it in a gallon ziploc bag and smash it with a rolling pin. Don't let crushing the grain keep you from using the toasted malt.

 

[CraigT]

okay thanks i never thought of that. this looks like a great recipe and kingbryan, i made your caramel amber a few months ago and it was the best amber i have ever tasted. so im excited to try this one out.

 

[KingBrianI]

okay thanks i never thought of that. this looks like a great recipe and kingbryan, i made your caramel amber a few months ago and it was the best amber i have ever tasted. so im excited to try this one out.

Very cool! I hope you enjoy this one as much!

 

[IrregularPulse]

What efficiency is this recipe based off?

 

[BetterSense]

Mine is in secondary now and I have to say I'm not impressed. The spices smelled and tasted better before, but at this point they have kind of blended together into something vaguely cinnamony but not fresh tasting. No "zing" at all. I actually wish I hadn't added the spices at all because it would probably taste decent as a plain beer. My family's pumpkin pie recipe is just cinnamon and cloves, so maybe it's the other spices I'm objecting to. I think I may try to add some cinnamon and clove tea before bottling. Also the vanilla sounds like it might be a good thing. How much vanilla have people been adding to the secondary? Are we talking a teaspoon or so?

 

[elproducto]

I had my first taste last night of my batch which I fermented with S-04. It finished pretty high 1.017, and the spices were really faint when I took the hydro sample so I added 1/2 tsp of spice to the keg. It's pretty sweet and overpowering right now.. I'm assuming the sweetness is from the pumpkin pie spice. I'm sure it will be great with a little time.

 

[cfonnes]

Mine is in secondary now and I have to say I'm not impressed. The spices smelled and tasted better before, but at this point they have kind of blended together into something vaguely cinnamony but not fresh tasting. No "zing" at all. I actually wish I hadn't added the spices at all because it would probably taste decent as a plain beer. My family's pumpkin pie recipe is just cinnamon and cloves, so maybe it's the other spices I'm objecting to. I think I may try to add some cinnamon and clove tea before bottling. Also the vanilla sounds like it might be a good thing. How much vanilla have people been adding to the secondary? Are we talking a teaspoon or so?

Be careful with the clove, I think that is what is giving mine a strong aftertaste.

 

[KingBrianI]

What efficiency is this recipe based off?

Oops, meant to look when I got home yesterday and forgot. I'll try remember to check Beersmith today when I get home and post up.

 

[midfielder5]

it looks like about 80% eff to me, as I had to add in some GP (2row) for my eff (70%).

 

[ucbedge]

Brewed this 12 days ago and it's sitting in my primary fermenter. Still getting bubbles out of the airlock at the rate of one every 45 seconds. Took a hydrometer reading and its sitting at 1.015, so I'll keep it there another few days. Taking longer in the primary than I ancitipated....

The only problem that I foresee is that my beer is much lighter than the picture posted on the first page of this thread. I think I'm around 9 SRM...which seems much lighter than either the recipe or the picture indicates. I came within one point of the OG, so I'm not sure what's causing the drastic color difference.

Beer taste after 12 days is nice, but definitely young. Sprice note is prominent to the smell...not so much to the taste. I dont know if its the age or if I took a faulty OG reading, but I was hoping for a bigger malt character than this beer has. Overall though, I'm impressed.

 

[KingBrianI]

it looks like about 80% eff to me, as I had to add in some GP (2row) for my eff (70%).

Close, it was based on 75% efficiency, just checked.

The only problem that I foresee is that my beer is much lighter than the picture posted on the first page of this thread. I think I'm around 9 SRM...which seems much lighter than either the recipe or the picture indicates. I came within one point of the OG, so I'm not sure what's causing the drastic color difference.

Hmm, did you remember to add the molasses? If so the only other thing I can think of is that for some reason, your toasted malt didn't get as dark as mine did. Or did you use crystal 20 or something in place of the 34L caramalt?

 

[bottlebomber]

ucbedge, I had the same experience of the beer seeming much lighter. When its a full pint glass, and not just a test vial full it may appear as it did in the picture though

 

[WarrantedFED]

I've decided to order the pumpkin ale extract kit from Northern Brewer and to put the wort onto the trub.

I accept that for a variety of reasons that I do so at my own peril, but call it a personality flaw or whatever, I have never overpitched the heck out of a beer before in this manner and I'd like to form my own opinion of the merits of doing so!

Like a butter knife into the electrical outlet, here I go!!

I kegged my beer this weekend out of the primary and dumped the Northern Brewer pumpkin ale onto the 2 gallons of trub that I had left over.

My initial impression, while the beer is still keg conditioning, is that the beer needs to sit for maybe a week or more to mellow out; I dumped some vanilla and Vietnamese ceylon sticks that had soaked in vodka, and provided plenty of the other spices as well. Since I had overdone it with cloves in some previous cooking recipe I exercised restraint with that one.

Initially I find the flavor to be rather spot on to a slice of pumpkin pie with a dollop of cool whip on top. The 2 lbs of oatmeal really came through nicely.

 

[mountainman13]

Whoever said they were going to brew this as a Saison, that's a great idea. Its not going to happen this year, but maybe next summer ill brew this mashing a little cooler, and use a saison yeast

It's still in the fermenter, but it tastes friggin awesome! I added fresh majoram leaves from my garden after a week of fermentation and also soaked American oak chips and whole cinnamon sticks in Maker's Mark for a week and threw it in. It's REAL hard to resist throwing this stuff in a keg. I'd like to bottle it, but I'm not sure that's gonna happen.

 

[ucbedge]

Thanks! Yes, I did take the SRM reading from a test vial so that could definitely skew my perception. I did add the molasses - in fact, I didn't make any changes to the recipe and basically hit my OG (one point off).

Besides the color though, I imagine that this beer tastes almost exactly as the OP intended. It's definitely not a spicy as Dogfish Head, for example, but it's infinitely more "pumpkin-y". Exactly how I prefer my pumpkin ale. Again, these impressions are from the primary fermenter, so take them for what their worth.

ucbedge, I had the same experience of the beer seeming much lighter. When its a full pint glass, and not just a test vial full it may appear as it did in the picture though

 

[Firebat138]

i actually forgot the molasses... so i added Kings syrup... hopefully that will suffice.

Close, it was based on 75% efficiency, just checked.



Hmm, did you remember to add the molasses? If so the only other thing I can think of is that for some reason, your toasted malt didn't get as dark as mine did. Or did you use crystal 20 or something in place of the 34L caramalt?

 

[DrinkNoH2O]

Brewed this on the 3rd following the recipe exactly except used WY1272. Scaled for my efficiency and hit my numbers exactly, even the FG.

This will be my first beer that I'll keg with my new setup, can't wait! I think I'll add about 2 teaspoons of real vanilla extract at kegging time as well to add a touch of whip-cream like flavor.

This is finally carbed and drinkable, tastes great. Didn't even bother with the vanilla - the spices were just right and I didn't want to "clutter" the flavor with more ingredients.

My FG was 1.014 which I think is prefect - just the right amount of body/residual sweetness to have a solid backbone, but not too much. This is going to be a hit at our Oktoberfest party next weekend, I can already tell.

 

[midfielder5]

Here is my sample from fermenter. Delic, even when warm & flat. mmmmmm beer. This is getting kegged tonight.

 

[wcrooker]

Has anyone tried mashing this with graham cracker? I was reading some of the posts and it came to mind. There is a recipe for a Graham cracker ale on hbt but and it says mash with two pounds, what do you guys think? I'm making this this weekend so I think I might try it.

 

[Aschecte]

stupid question .... I'm brewing this today and have a question about the clove. Is the clove for 1/4tsp of the whole clove or did you grind the clove and it's a 1/4 tsp of ground/crushed clove ? Thanks for the info.

 

[Daryl]

Finally was able to enjoy a couple pints of this last night after exercising lots of patience. This is an excellent beer! So good I'm going to brew another batch next week. The aroma, the color and the taste really combine into a beer that I've never experienced before. Hats off to you again for sharing this recipe.

 

[KingBrianI]

stupid question .... I'm brewing this today and have a question about the clove. Is the clove for 1/4tsp of the whole clove or did you grind the clove and it's a 1/4 tsp of ground/crushed clove ? Thanks for the info.

It is 1/4 teaspoon of ground clove.

Finally was able to enjoy a couple pints of this last night after exercising lots of patience. This is an excellent beer! So good I'm going to brew another batch next week. The aroma, the color and the taste really combine into a beer that I've never experienced before. Hats off to you again for sharing this recipe.

glad you like it!

 

[Aschecte]

excellent thanks I'm measuring it as I type

 

[Aschecte]

Just finished brewing this recipe....do not skimp on the rice hulls !!!! I have brewed wheat beer before and this was easily the trickest sparge I have ever encountered ( I only used 1/2 a lb of hulls ) multiple stuck runnings and a slow sparge at best for 2 hours but The wort tastes great and the spices taste spot on.... Can't wait for the 30 days to be up to taste this again. As a side note this brew also hit my personal highest mash eff at 81%.

 

[FuelshopMcgee]

Just brewed this for my 2nd year in a row..Last year for thanksgiving I couldn't keep people out of the keg. This year I'm not doing a huge dinner so more for the wife and I. Thanks again for a great recipe!