The Plan: Let's make a pumpkin ale, shall we?
Recipe:
9/21 BREW DAY:
10/6 BOTTLED:
10/16 TASTING:
Monday, September 21, 2009
Pumpkin Ale
The Plan: Let's make a pumpkin ale, shall we?
Recipe:
9/21 BREW DAY:
10/6 BOTTLED:
10/16 TASTING:
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Pumpkin Stout
THE PLAN:
So I had this idea to make a pumpkin brown... I did some searching online for some recipes, and one of the ones was a pumpkin porter. I printed it out way back in 2003, but it wasn't until this year (2009), 6 years later, that I pulled it to use it as a base recipe. Well to my surprise, I knew the author. I couldn't believe it, so funny. Anyways, I changed a few things around from his original version... and my pumpkin brown ended up becoming a pretty damn good pumpkin stout.
THE RECIPE:
OG 1.050 (estimated)
FG 1.018
6.6# Pale LME
1# Choc Malt
1/2# Victory Malt
1/4# Crystal 10L
1/4# Crystal 40L
1/4# Crystal 60L
1/4# Crystal 80L
2/3 oz EKG (60 min)
2/3 oz Homegrown Tettnang (60 min)
1/3 oz EKG (15 min)
1/3 oz Homegrown Tettnang (15 min)
1 tsp Irish Moss
Pumpkin Mix: (baked @ 350F for 45 min prior to boil)
45 oz canned pumpkin
1 T pumpkin pie spice
1 c. Brown Sugar
8/16 BREWDAY:
I made a yeast slurry on 8/15, and put on stir plate for 24 hours. Started brewday off with making pumpkin mix and put it in the over @ 350 for 45 minutes. I also added the specialty grains to the water and started raising the temp to 150F.
8/26 RACKED TO SECONDARY:
Racked 4.5 gallons to secondary. Gravity =1.014. Bitterness was gone, pumpkin aroma & taste was hardly noticeable Tasted very much like a porter. Added another 1 T of pumpkin pie spice.
9/18 BOTTLED:
Dark, looks pretty clear, spicey aroma, enticing, tastes pretty good, only better with bottling!
10/16 BEER TASTING:
Decided to pull a bottle out and try it at our Fall beer tasting. And although it poured a little flat, I had everyone try it, and there were mixed opinions of which people liked better... my pumpkin ale or my pumpkin stout, but everyone enjoyed both. Two particular people that attended, Ernie & Paul, were a beer judge and local micro brewer (respectively). They both thought this would do well with some aging.
10/1 SECOND TASTING:
Ahh... nice tan frothy head this time. Almost all pumpkin flavor has been masked by malts. Definitely needs some more time.
10/30: Took a 22 oz bottle to Cape Ann Brewing Co. I tasted their Pumpkin Stout for the first time and I really couldn't believe how close mine was. Jen and I brought home a growler of it, and did a blind taste test to each other. We both got them wrong, we really couldn't tell them apart. I asked the guys at Cape Ann to write to me with a review, even upon asking again they didn't send anything. :-(
5/1 HOMEBREW COMP: So I had two 22oz bottles left and I decided to enter one of them into the local homebrew competition. Glad I did because it placed 3rd in category 21A, the Spice, Herb, and Vegetable Beer category! Attached below are two judges scoresheets/comments. I still have 1 bottle left and plan to open when I brew it again this summer.
So I had this idea to make a pumpkin brown... I did some searching online for some recipes, and one of the ones was a pumpkin porter. I printed it out way back in 2003, but it wasn't until this year (2009), 6 years later, that I pulled it to use it as a base recipe. Well to my surprise, I knew the author. I couldn't believe it, so funny. Anyways, I changed a few things around from his original version... and my pumpkin brown ended up becoming a pretty damn good pumpkin stout.
THE RECIPE:
OG 1.050 (estimated)
FG 1.018
6.6# Pale LME
1# Choc Malt
1/2# Victory Malt
1/4# Crystal 10L
1/4# Crystal 40L
1/4# Crystal 60L
1/4# Crystal 80L
2/3 oz EKG (60 min)
2/3 oz Homegrown Tettnang (60 min)
1/3 oz EKG (15 min)
1/3 oz Homegrown Tettnang (15 min)
1 tsp Irish Moss
Pumpkin Mix: (baked @ 350F for 45 min prior to boil)
45 oz canned pumpkin
1 T pumpkin pie spice
1 c. Brown Sugar
8/16 BREWDAY:
I made a yeast slurry on 8/15, and put on stir plate for 24 hours. Started brewday off with making pumpkin mix and put it in the over @ 350 for 45 minutes. I also added the specialty grains to the water and started raising the temp to 150F.
8/26 RACKED TO SECONDARY:
Racked 4.5 gallons to secondary. Gravity =1.014. Bitterness was gone, pumpkin aroma & taste was hardly noticeable Tasted very much like a porter. Added another 1 T of pumpkin pie spice.
9/18 BOTTLED:
Dark, looks pretty clear, spicey aroma, enticing, tastes pretty good, only better with bottling!
10/16 BEER TASTING:
Decided to pull a bottle out and try it at our Fall beer tasting. And although it poured a little flat, I had everyone try it, and there were mixed opinions of which people liked better... my pumpkin ale or my pumpkin stout, but everyone enjoyed both. Two particular people that attended, Ernie & Paul, were a beer judge and local micro brewer (respectively). They both thought this would do well with some aging.
10/1 SECOND TASTING:
Ahh... nice tan frothy head this time. Almost all pumpkin flavor has been masked by malts. Definitely needs some more time.
10/30: Took a 22 oz bottle to Cape Ann Brewing Co. I tasted their Pumpkin Stout for the first time and I really couldn't believe how close mine was. Jen and I brought home a growler of it, and did a blind taste test to each other. We both got them wrong, we really couldn't tell them apart. I asked the guys at Cape Ann to write to me with a review, even upon asking again they didn't send anything. :-(
5/1 HOMEBREW COMP: So I had two 22oz bottles left and I decided to enter one of them into the local homebrew competition. Glad I did because it placed 3rd in category 21A, the Spice, Herb, and Vegetable Beer category! Attached below are two judges scoresheets/comments. I still have 1 bottle left and plan to open when I brew it again this summer.
Tuesday, July 28, 2009
Wit Did You Say?
THE PLAN: 
Being from PA, there are some great craft brewers in that state that I fell in love with. One of them being Victory, based out of Downington. Many moons ago, I attended my first microbrew festival in State College, my friends and I couldn't get over one of Victory's beers called Whirlwind. It was so refreshing, sweet, and light. We wore out our welcome at their booth. I actually was doing a little bit of brewing back then so I knew enough to ask some recipe questions, of which I have saved a napkin with these items written on them. I always wanted to try to clone this beer, so this wit was my attempt.
THE RECIPE:
OG 1.054
FG 1.018
ABV 4.69%
IBU 15.1
6# Wheat Dry Malt Extract
3/4# Pilsner 2 Row
3/4# Flaked Wheat
1 oz Tettnang
1 oz Tettnang
1 oz Sweet Orange Peel
1 oz Bitter Orange Peel
Wyeast 3944 - Belgian Witbier liquid yeast
7/28 BREWDAY:
Pretty straight forward extract brew. Steeped the pils/flaked wheat at 160F for 15 min. At boil I added 3# of the wheat DME, and 1 oz Tett. With 10 minutes left I added the other 3# of wheat DME, 1 oz Tett, and 1 oz of each bitter & sweet orange peel.
8/11: So this thing fermented like crazy! I made the mistake of putting it into my 5 gal. carboy, should've used the 6... even w/ the 6 I think this thing would have run off the same way. Anyways... the krausen blew out the blow off tube a couple of times... and even after 2 WEEKS!!! it was still bubbling every 7 or 8 seconds. A friend told me to still rack it to primary after a week no matter what. I shall listen next time.
8/12 RACKED & BOTTLED: (skipped secondary, was getting anxious). G was around 1025/1030... not great after all that freaky fermenting that happened. Tasted kinda blah.
8/18 TASTING: This was the night of the 1st beer tasting... I opened a bottle ahead of time to see if was worthy of sharing, eventhough it had only been bottle the Wednesday before, so 6 days. Holy shit! So freakin awesome!!! Sweet aroma, sweet taste, color was beautiful... not as white as whirlwind but very nice. A little longer in the bottle and this thing will be phenomenol!!! I had everyone try it at the tasting and they all liked it. A friend, and more experienced brewer, thinks I could have improved it by fermenting at a lower temp. But what a great first attempt!
8/26: Found 3 bottles w/ bottoms broken out and beer drained. Taste is still pretty stellar. Overcarbonation sucks though.
8/30: FG: 1.018 not too shabby.
Being from PA, there are some great craft brewers in that state that I fell in love with. One of them being Victory, based out of Downington. Many moons ago, I attended my first microbrew festival in State College, my friends and I couldn't get over one of Victory's beers called Whirlwind. It was so refreshing, sweet, and light. We wore out our welcome at their booth. I actually was doing a little bit of brewing back then so I knew enough to ask some recipe questions, of which I have saved a napkin with these items written on them. I always wanted to try to clone this beer, so this wit was my attempt.THE RECIPE:
OG 1.054
FG 1.018
ABV 4.69%
IBU 15.1
6# Wheat Dry Malt Extract
3/4# Pilsner 2 Row
3/4# Flaked Wheat
1 oz Tettnang
1 oz Tettnang
1 oz Sweet Orange Peel
1 oz Bitter Orange Peel
Wyeast 3944 - Belgian Witbier liquid yeast
7/28 BREWDAY:
Pretty straight forward extract brew. Steeped the pils/flaked wheat at 160F for 15 min. At boil I added 3# of the wheat DME, and 1 oz Tett. With 10 minutes left I added the other 3# of wheat DME, 1 oz Tett, and 1 oz of each bitter & sweet orange peel.
8/11: So this thing fermented like crazy! I made the mistake of putting it into my 5 gal. carboy, should've used the 6... even w/ the 6 I think this thing would have run off the same way. Anyways... the krausen blew out the blow off tube a couple of times... and even after 2 WEEKS!!! it was still bubbling every 7 or 8 seconds. A friend told me to still rack it to primary after a week no matter what. I shall listen next time.
8/12 RACKED & BOTTLED: (skipped secondary, was getting anxious). G was around 1025/1030... not great after all that freaky fermenting that happened. Tasted kinda blah.
8/18 TASTING: This was the night of the 1st beer tasting... I opened a bottle ahead of time to see if was worthy of sharing, eventhough it had only been bottle the Wednesday before, so 6 days. Holy shit! So freakin awesome!!! Sweet aroma, sweet taste, color was beautiful... not as white as whirlwind but very nice. A little longer in the bottle and this thing will be phenomenol!!! I had everyone try it at the tasting and they all liked it. A friend, and more experienced brewer, thinks I could have improved it by fermenting at a lower temp. But what a great first attempt!
8/26: Found 3 bottles w/ bottoms broken out and beer drained. Taste is still pretty stellar. Overcarbonation sucks though.
8/30: FG: 1.018 not too shabby.
Friday, June 19, 2009
Baby Brew Pale Ale
THE PLAN: I was hanging out with my friend Jamie, he was interested in learning how to brew, so we just went to the homebrew shop on a whim and grabbed some stuff to make a pretty generic pale ale. Other than three or four scattered attempts over the last 2 years I had lived in VT, it had been a good 6 years since I really brewed. So this was kind of a restart for me with brewing.
THE RECIPE:
OG 1.040
FG 1.010
IBU 28.4
ABV 3.9%
6.6# Pale LME
1/2# Crystal 60L
2 oz Tettnang (homegrown) (60 min)
1/2 oz Cascade (15 min)
1/2 oz Fuggles (15 min)
1/2 oz Fuggles (5 min)
1/2 oz Cascade (5 min)
1 tsp Irish Moss
Munton dry ale yeast
6/19: BREWDAY:
Nothing super special about this other than actually brewing. Pretty straight forward extract batch. I see now (May '10) that my hop schedule was pretty lame. I'll definitely change that around for the next pale ale.
6/23 RACK TO SECONDARY, maybe bottled:
No memory of this lol
7/20 TASTING:
Good stuff! More malt next time for sure, more hops, use liquid yeast too.
THE RECIPE:
OG 1.040
FG 1.010
IBU 28.4
ABV 3.9%
6.6# Pale LME
1/2# Crystal 60L
2 oz Tettnang (homegrown) (60 min)
1/2 oz Cascade (15 min)
1/2 oz Fuggles (15 min)
1/2 oz Fuggles (5 min)
1/2 oz Cascade (5 min)
1 tsp Irish Moss
Munton dry ale yeast
6/19: BREWDAY:
Nothing super special about this other than actually brewing. Pretty straight forward extract batch. I see now (May '10) that my hop schedule was pretty lame. I'll definitely change that around for the next pale ale.
6/23 RACK TO SECONDARY, maybe bottled:
No memory of this lol
7/20 TASTING:
Good stuff! More malt next time for sure, more hops, use liquid yeast too.
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