Autumn Seasonal Beer Thunderstruck Pumpkin Ale (AG and Extract versions)

[womencantsail]

Taste it first - it may not need anything. If you find that it needs something, add a little at a time until it meets your expectations.

That just makes entirely too much sense. Thanks, Yuri.

 

[BeerBudha]

man i was so excited about this beer. but i bottled it today and it taste like i used lemonade as my base. completely sour i just hope it mellows out enough to drink in a few weeks.

 

[ThinBlueLine]

yuri- did you just use the standard 3/4 cup priming sugar at bottling?

 

[tomwirsing]

By adding the spices as a "tea", how can you do this with the very fine spices? I see the very fine spices leeching out of a tea bag.

Also, when using beersmith to scale the recipe down to 5 gallons, what mash profile should I choose? I use a 15 gallon keggle to mash in and I do a batch sparge.

The "tea" refers to boiling the spices in some water to sanitize. The boiling water extracts the spices flavors and you have a sanitized, spice flavored, solution you can safely add.

 

[dmbnpj]

Cool, thanks. Would it be beneficial to use ground ginger instead of ginger root since it is in a fine powder that will boil well in that "tea"?

 

[Yuri_Rage]

yuri- did you just use the standard 3/4 cup priming sugar at bottling?

I keg.

 

[womencantsail]

If anybody that has bottled this could answer, I know I'd appreciate it.

 

[Yuri_Rage]

Sorry for the smart ass answer. Use 5 oz of dextrose to prime a 5 gallon batch.

 

[womencantsail]

Hah, it's okay.

Thanks for the info.

 

[bmckee56]

I have read the entire 19 pages of posts and am excited to try my first Pumpkin Ale using the recipe YR has posted and updated.

I am curious though to see if anyone has ever tried using a Pumpkin Extract instead of the actual Pumpkin in a recipe. I have found several locations for extract (liquid) and might try to brew a batch using it.

Check out their product: http://www.faeriesfinest.com/E154.html

My biggest concern is the loss of body due to using no actual Pumpkin and the overall O.G. obtained during the mash.

Obvious advantage would be no stuck run off.

Anyone have any comments on this possibility?

Salute!

 

[dmbnpj]

Yuri, if you used beersmith, which mash profile did you choose?

Also, what do you think about ground ginger instead of the ginger root?

 

[Spyd3r]

I brewed a batch of this tonight with a couple of substitutions...

7.5# Light LME
1oz Goldings
S-04

The 60oz of pumpkin was EXTREMELY difficult for me to find. I went to every grocer in the area(including 2 different Walmart's), but I finally found some organic pumpkin at the whole foods store. The money I saved going with LME, more than paid for the extra cost of organic pumpkin.

I didn't add the spices yet. I'm going to wait until I move it to secondary like the recipe indicates. Right now, it's sitting in a swamp cooler in my newly configured fermentation chamber of sorts...really it's just a wooden bathroom closet. lol

In any case, this is my second batch and I corrected most of the mistakes that I made in my innagural brew. The first being...Relax. Don't Worry. Have a Homebrew.

I tried to strain the pumpkin away as I poured it into the fermenter, but the strainer got clogged...haha...so I abandoned that endeaver. Oh well, my first batch yielded a crapload of trub too.

I plan on kegging this brew, which will be my first kegged beer!

OG 1.055

 

[Yuri_Rage]

Yuri, if you used beersmith, which mash profile did you choose?

Also, what do you think about ground ginger instead of the ginger root?

My own. Single infusion, 158 degrees F.

Ground ginger is just fine.

 

[HellenicHomeBrewer]

hot diggity, getting ready to brew this puppy this week but, as many others, i have a question.

1. Is there an conversion to use fresh pumpkins? 60oz canned /= 60oz fresh cubed? i want to try my hardest to retain some pumpkin flavor, I understand that most of it is lost, but since I just brewed a Holiday spice I don't need it to be similar..

 

[RUbrew]

Just cracked into a bottle of this and it was amazing. Great Recipe!!

 

[Spyd3r]

Just cracked into a bottle of this and it was amazing. Great Recipe!!

Did you use the spice amounts as listed, or adjust to taste?

 

[Yuri_Rage]

I highly recommend intentionally undershooting the spices during your brew day and adjusting to taste with the "tea" method.

 

[GeorgeH]

I brewed this for my housewarming party and people loved it. I'll definitely be keeping this recipe around, thanks Yuri!

 

[RUbrew]

I followed the recipe exactly as its listed. Just make sure that when you buy the canned pumpkin you don't unintentionally buy it pre-spiced ( I did that with my second batch, and I'm waiting to see how that will effect things).

 

[Spyd3r]

I highly recommend intentionally undershooting the spices during your brew day and adjusting to taste with the "tea" method.

Well ****...I didn't put any spice in during the brewing, and am waiting to add them in the secondary like the recipe stated.

 

[dmbnpj]

Just FYI, I found the canned pumpkin here in NC at Harris Teeter.

Also, for all those who converted down to a 5 gallon batch, or Yuri please chime in also...how much pumpkin do you recommend to mash with?

 

[FuelshopMcgee]

Just pulled this from primary and racked onto spiced tea...It sat on the trub for about 2 weeks and I plan to let it sit another 2 in the secondary.

Gravity was on point *I did the extract version*.

Question though...Is this one of those beers that tastes amazing from the hydro sample but tastes amazingly awesome after carbing up? I tasted the sample post spice tea addition and man it was on freaking point!

Can't wait to knock some back on thanksgiving!

My plan to make this a little extra fancy is to make a mixture of crushed gingerbread, cinnamon plus(very little), and some orange colored decorating sugar and coat the rim of the glass margarita style...Just to be festive

 

[Spyd3r]

3 days into fermenting and the temps are holding solid at 68F. Bubbling has slowed to 1 every 8-10 seconds. I plan on waiting another week until the rack to secondary/spice tea.

I'm gonna do it right this time, and probably swamp cooler the secondary as well. I have a surprisingly perfect fermentation chamber in my house that I didn't even think about prior to this brew. It's a fairly large linen cabinet in my bathroom. Ambient air temp is 72F.

 

[ThinBlueLine]

I brewed this on Tuesday and it smelled awesome! I added 1 teaspoon of cinnamon plus during the last 5 minutes of the boil and it smelled like I was cooking pumpkin pie in my garage!

I couldn't find canned pumpkin anywhere. I live in Tulsa OK and every store I went to told me that they havent been able to get any in. I even went to Dallas this weekend for a football game and looked there but they seemed to be out as well.

If anyone else has had a problem finding the canned stuff this is what I did: I bought 1 medium sized baking pumpkin and cut it in half (the grocery stores should have whole pumpkins now). I scooped all the seeds and "****" out of it and placed it on a baking sheet open side down. The pumpkin then went into the oven at 350 degrees for about an hour. You'll know its about done when the shell starts to sag and the pumpkin begins to exude a watery substance. Once it was cool enough I used an icecream scoop to scoop all of the pumpkin meat into a food processor. Make sure you dont get any of the skin in there. I pureed it till it was the consistency of the canned stuff and from there I followed Yuri's instructions... IE spread on a baking sheet and bake at 350 for 30 minutes before adding to wort.

Correct me if I'm wrong Yuri but I think this should come out pretty close to the canned stuff. Either way, it's the closest I could get with the apparent shortage we've got going on

 

[jajabee]

For folks in Portland, I couldn't find Libbey's canned pumpkin at any of the conventional supermarkets, but I did find organic canned pumpkin at the Food Front co-op. You could also try New Seasons, I bet they have brands other than Libbey's. And, randomly, Portland Pet Supply on Hawthorne is selling 100% pumpkin in cans, meant for people who want to give their dogs something to calm their stomachs. Heh.

I'm going to try Yuri's 6 gallon version tomorrow, just have to find that cinnamon plus and I'll be set! Is that something you can buy in stores, usually?

 

[FuelshopMcgee]

No pampered chef stuff is not something you will find in stores you have to order it but you can easily make it yourself or probably just get away using that pumpkin pie spice mix which smells about the same *you can find this easily*.

 

[jajabee]

Ok cool, just brewed up about 6 gallons of this, no problems sparging thanks to the rice hulls! I went with Wyeast 1099, and a teaspoon of the pumpkin pie spice. I plan to add more spice, lactose, and possibly pumpkin extract at bottling if I think it needs it. Definitely going for a sweet pumpkin pie sort of flavor.

 

[ThatGuyRyan]

Just racked mine to keg last night and wow the Pumpkin is back! The flavor must have been covered by the yeast still that last time I took a sample because its back baby!

Now I need to force myself not to start drinking it yet!

 

[conpewter]

I'm planning on using real pumpkin, in fact I may mash in one and then ferment in one (but only 1 gallon fermenting in a pumpkin in case it goes sour). I wanted to put my electric element in the 3rd one I grew and boil in it, but I think the pumpkin would just sag and leak during the boil.

Anyway as for the addition of pumpkin to the mash, would leaving the skin on be a bad thing?

 

[goetzUM]

For the extract recipe, what's the point of baking the canned pumpkin if you're just going to boil it for an hour? Seems that boiling it for an hour will cook it plenty and may even be able to pull more taste out of the pumpkin. No?