Pumpkin Ale Recipe Check please

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Chuckie said:
Well, I got it into the keg, carbonated for a 2 days and did the taste test.
Was a bit disappointed.
Colour is pretty lame.
Taste is a bit watery.
Alcohol level is a bit too high for my liking.
I'm letting it age a bit now I think. Will try it in a few weeks and see if it's improved (rounded off in flavours etc).
Ahh well, it was worth a shot.
Packs a punch though, so it'll be good to get the head fuzzy with LOL.
:chug:
Can you taste pumpkin?
 
Bugger. I'm still planning this one . Once of "hallowoween" brew . Will try maybe mid June so it's got four months in the bottle before enjoying.

Do you think more pumpkin? Maybe use a litre of pumpkin soup?
 
I would look for a better recipe. The one I used had a ABV of 7.2% predicted, I think.
Looking back at it I shouldv'e gone for something with a lower ABV, say 4.5%. That would give a rounder alcohol level.
And it needs more colour and a better malt profile.
I'm also not sure about the pumpkin. I did cut it into chunks when I roasted it and then I tossed it in a mesh bag to go into the fermenter. If I were to do it again I think I would mash it before I put it into the bag.
Yeah, the pumpkin soup might work. Dunno ?
Cheers.
 
I made my pumpkin ale last night, in the end following the all grain recipe from Homebrewer mag. Simple enough - pale alt malt base, a little Vienna malt (this was my sub for Munich malt), some crystal malt, and pumpkin in the mash. I think it went well, but my gravity was four points below what was predicted - they gave in the recipe an OG of 1.064; I got 1.060.

Pumpkin is probably an unpredictable brewing ingredient anyway - not sure how much sugar it has in it, and it would probably vary depending on which type of pumpkin you had. I may have slightly overestimated the weight of the pumpkin (not making allowances for scraping out seeds, skin, etc). And I finished the boil a bit too early so it hadn't entirely boiled down (because the damn boil was just taking so bloody long, closer to 2 hours than 70 mins!). So, given those factors I guess a gravity four points below what's predicted isn't too bad. I checked other recipes with a similar grain bill and found the predicted gravity was in the 50-55 area, so I guess the pumpkin probably added a good 5-10 points to the original recipe.

The pumpkin's added some distinctive sweetness, a nice orangey colour (a bit muddy at the moment but it should clarify in the fermentation), and.... a little charcoaley taste from the skins. I think it'll make a nice spicy brew.
 
A quick update on my Pumpkin brew.
It's been 3 weeks since kegging/bottling now. I've had a keg in the fridge and it's still there.
BUT !
I cracked a stubbie I had bottled with the remainder of the fermenter and it's pretty good actually.
It has the nice Christmas spice about it and a reasonable pumpkin colour and a hint of pumpkin taste.
If I were to do it again I'd lover the ABV (is 7.4%) and add some more colour and maybe a bit more pumpkin (was 500g).
I haven't yet checked the kegged beer which I thought was dodgy, but I'll do that later today.
It might be that it got a keg infection and the bottled brew didn't.
So, maybe a bit of tweaking and maybe I'll try it again at some stage.
I'll be interested to hear how you guys go.
Cheers,
Andrew
 
Nice one

I've managed to find some canned US pumpkin, so when I do this brew I'm going to try with that. The US foods shop Melbourne has it in stock!!

Great to hear your is tasting better- you seemed quite defeated over it last time you posted!!
 
Yeah, I was pretty bummed. I did have a schooners of it from the keg last night and it was..........ok.
Certainly not great. Possibly not even pretty good or even good.
Just.......ok.
Ah well, live and learn.
I couldn't drink more than 1 at a go. Definitely not a session beer.
Hope the canned stuff gives you some better flavour. Could well do.
Cheers
Andrew
 
PS - in retrospect : I would keep the ABV down. Certainly not above 5%.
Also I would up the bitterness from my recipe (under this topic). Mine is definitely too sweet.
 
Is it a pumpkiny sweetness? The pumpkin might have some unpredictable sugars in it, I think - stuff that's more hard to ferment than malt sugars.
 
I roasted my pumpkin first to get caramelisation happening, then the next day I mashed. Skin still on. If I'd been more fussy I would have removed the skin before dunking it in the mash. All the flesh seemed to dissipate during the mash anyway.

Roasting would probably be better than boiling - no chance of any starch or sugar being lost in the boil water.

It's looking very foamy now. I have a feeling this could be a very frothy heady beer (pretty much what I want, so I'm happy).
 
TimT said:
Is it a pumpkiny sweetness? The pumpkin might have some unpredictable sugars in it, I think - stuff that's more hard to ferment than malt sugars.
Yeah, my FG was a few points higher than I expected, I even pitched more yeast (us-05) and gave it another week but the gravity didn't drop below 1.020

Edit: testing a bottle on thursday
 
ro55c0 said:
Yeah, my FG was a few points higher than I expected, I even pitched more yeast (us-05) and gave it another week but the gravity didn't drop below 1.020

Edit: testing a bottle on thursday
What was your mash temp?
 
[SIZE=10.5pt]Had a go at mine last week, I was pleasantly surprised. The high FG gave it a really nice thick mouthfeel, the overwhelming flavour is the spices but you can taste some roast pumpkin there too. I made a traditional pumpkin pie last week so I could see what the yanks were on about and the beer was pretty close to that flavour. It's not a quaffer but definitely one I'll be bringing out when friends are over for dinner. [/SIZE]
 
Mine's been in primary for 7 days and woah can you taste the pumpkin. It's still young and I'm not even going to think about bottling it for another 2 weeks.

I did add some more spice as I found they didn't show through at all...
 
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