Recipe

return to pumpkin ale page

 2003 Pumpkin Beer Label

Pumpkin Ale 2003

 

 

Batch Number:
 030906
Starting Gravity:
1.090
    Final Gravity: 1.005
Ingredients:
            
Fermentable 1:
 9 lbs crushed Briess Pale Malt
Fermentable 2:
 1 lb Briess Torrefied Wheat
Fermentable 3:
 12 oz Carapils 6L
Fermentable 4:
 6 lbs fresh pumpkin diced and toasted
Fermentable 5:
 3 lbs Wildflower Honey
Flavoring 1:
 1.5 Tbs whole allspice
Flavoring 2:
 1 stick cinnamon crushed into small pieces
Flavoring 3:
 3/4 oz candied ginger
Flavoring 4:
 0.5 tsp whole cloves
Other 1:
 3/4 C corn sugar for priming
Hops 1:
 2 oz Northern Brewer
Alpha:
 7.4%
Time:
 30 minutes
Yeast:
 1 pkt (11.5g) Edme dried ale yeast
Process:
 (pix here)
  • Cut pumpkin into pieces 3/4inch to 1 inch dice and trimmed off rind.
  • Arranged pumpkin pieces on cookie sheets and roast on low roast until lightly browned
  • Layered grains and pumpkin pieces in 5 gallon igloo cooler/mash tun -  added hot water to bring temp of mash to 140F
  • Stirred mash thoroughly, covered and left to sit
  • Due to interruption, the mash was left overnight - approx 10 hours (see notes)
  • Drained mash into boiling pot,
  • Sparged grains with boiling water
  • Added malt syrup & honey and brought to boil
  • At 30 minutes, added hops
  • Crushed whole spices
  • At 60 minutes, removed wort from heat and added spices
  • Added water to make 5 gallons
  • Cooled
  • Pitched yeast
  • Fermentation took 8 days
Notes:

I was fortunate.  The long mash resulted in a sour flavor due, no doubt, to organisms in the grain.  I was not sure at bottling time if the the beer would be drinkable, but after conditioning, the acidity proved to be a pleasant note.  If I could count on the same organisms being present in all batches, I might adopt this as a regular technique, but I suspect that there may be much worse results some of the time and I don't like to risk the time and effort - to say nothing of the brewing resources.