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I make Pumpkin ale every year, It always gets rave reviews!
First of all, Take my advise and use real pumpkin, and lots of it! It's worth it for the flavor and color it provides. Additionally it doesn't stick up a mash like canned will.
I'll post my recipe for 10 gallons

I half and clean a large pumpkin and oven roast it until it caramelizes. Scoop the soft roasted pumpkin into your tun. Around 15-20 pounds of roasted pumpkin gives good color and flavor. Last year I used 2 large pumpkins. Here are some pics on the roast you want to achieve.Pictures

16# 2 row
1# 20*l crystal Malt
1# un-malted wheat
.5# victory Malt
8 OZ Chocolate Malt

Step mash 30min @ 132*
60min @ 156*
I Batch sparge as close to 170* as I can get.
Runoff 11-11.5 Gallons
Bring to boil
Boil 30 min
Add 1.0 OZ Hallertau (60min Bittering)
Add .5 OZ Perle (60min Bittering)


At 30min remain add 2 liberal inches cinnamon bark (crushed)
At 15min remain add 2TBSP FRESH Nutmeg (crushed)
At 15min remain add 2TBSP FRESH whole Mace (crushed)
At 15min remain add 1TBSP FRESH Powdered Ginger
At 15min remain add Irish Moss
At Beginning of Whirlpool add 1 KG Lactose

Pitch Healthy Starter (2 Liters or More) of 1056 liquid yeast, or 2 packs of S04...

This is sure to be a Hit at the Oktoberfest party's out there. It is a pretty big pumpkin ale though so don't count on everybody drinking 10 of them. It's best to have a lighter beer on tap with it. I've had it last a year in kegs chilled. The spice mellows with time. I found it best at around 2 months old. It's a great Christmas beer too!

Are you using the littler pie pumpkins, or the standard Superstore/Sobeys pumpkins?

Medium sized grocery store pumpkins. I use 2.

I used 2 litres of last year's pureed and frozen pumpkin in a 40litre batch, and that was plenty for me. Damn mash tun was draining so slowly from all the gunk!

If you puree it, or use canned. things get sticky. If you roast it and put it in the mash with a spoon or your hands, it is a lot better. I also use a 2 inch bed of rice hulls which I avoid stirring.

Mine was pureed, but I did mix up the rice hulls while adding the water, to ensure the best efficiency/sugar extraction from the malt... I guess I'll have to live with that if I want to get the best efficiency from the pumpkin and malt. But if I wasn't so concerned, I could be a bit more gentle.

I used shredded pumpkin in the mash. Turned out really good.

I suggest that you read this first:
http://www.wpbf.com/r/25853470/detail.html

Is the 30 min at 132 a cereal step mash for the un malted wheat? Could I just use the flaked wheat that dave sells? And skip that mash step? Or do the main mash for longer?

Also you said

Bring to boil
Boil 30 min
Add 1.0 OZ Hallertau (60min Bittering)
Add .5 OZ Perle (60min Bittering)

So 90 min boil with the only hop additions at 60?

mthibodeau wrote:Is the 30 min at 132 a cereal step mash for the un malted wheat? Could I just use the flaked wheat that dave sells? And skip that mash step? Or do the main mash for longer?

Also you said

Bring to boil
Boil 30 min
Add 1.0 OZ Hallertau (60min Bittering)
Add .5 OZ Perle (60min Bittering)

So 90 min boil with the only hop additions at 60?

132* is a protein rest. The long boil is for a little more Malliard reaction...

What malt do you use for that Nick? Is that the same wheat you use in your Hoeegarden clone?

Keggermeister wrote:132* is a protein rest. The long boil is for a little more Malliard reaction...

Awesome, thanks. This may end up a nice addition to Christmas dinner.

Few more questions, have you tried it with each yeast type you have listed? 1056 is american ale I believe (same as us-05) and the other us the s-04. If you have used both which turned out better? I think the english probably, but just curious if you have tried both.

Also have you, or anybody else for that matter, put pumpkin into beer smith? From the internet I found a suggestion of using 1.005 as potential and yeild as 10% and colour as 3 srm. If I put it in as a sugar it cranks the abv way up, if I put it in as an adjunct, it changes the mash volumes quite a bit as it assumes its going to absorb a few gallons of water (treats it the same as 10lbs or grain). So how have people worked with this in the past?

When we used it, I believe we treated it as not contributing much of anything fermentable-wise. I'm sure there's some, but fairly low compared to the malts.

chalmers wrote:When we used it, I believe we treated it as not contributing much of anything fermentable-wise. I'm sure there's some, but fairly low compared to the malts.

I did the same. I also threw a few handfuls of rice hulls into the mash because it makes the mash pretty sticky and thick.

ok, so I have it in beersmith as an adjunct, doesnt contribute much, and I am planning for the rice hulls. Any advise on the ammount of strike water? Beersmith just assumes any adjunct is a grain and will absorb the regular amount of water but im assuming pumpkin wont

I'd agree with you, probably not a lot of water going into the pumpkin, depending on what format it's in. How thick/thin do you tend to mash? Water to grist ratio? How much pumpkin puree are you adding?

Only done one all grain so far, so no real idea yet on how thick/thin, although since I'm doing a 2 vessel I was planning full volume mash most of the time, but with a two step I'm not really sure

Can you give us numbers from your BeerSmith, or your previous brewday?

If you're doing a full volume mash, then I imagine there will be plenty of water, and you could always add a bit in the kettle at the beginning of the boil if you are significantly low.

I might try to pick up the best case pumpkin kit from noble grape. Since these are extract kits that come with canned pumpkin meat, I assume that it will just be added to the boil? Or maybe steeped? Anybody know? Not sure if I'm wasting my time with that kit or not. Don't really have time to do an all grain batch this weekend.

I think it's just the spices...

Tbh I dislike pumpkin ale...

We've always mashed with the pumpkin (makes for a fun mash out, but if you're steeping, you can just raise the bag), because I thought there was some starch that needed conversion from the mash enzymes. I'm not sure if that's true, however.

jacinthebox wrote:I think it's just the spices...

Tbh I dislike pumpkin ale...

I don't think pumpkin adds much, if anything to a pumpkin beer. It's all about the spices.

I don't like pumpkin beer either.

I like Pumpkin Beers to the same degree I like IPAs (or Browns, or Lagers): some are great, others are shit. I'm no pumpkin beer racist like you horrible people!

Some use pumpkin, others don't. I believe all of the pumpkin beers I've had also included the typical "pumpkin pie" spices, but there are probably some out there that don't.

chalmers wrote: I'm no pumpkin beer racist like you horrible people!

I'm not sure I fall into that category but I've only ever had garrisons double jack and propellers pumpkin ale and wasn't a huge fan of either. I'm assuming a good home brewed version would be nice!

Well you're in luck, I think I'm brewing this one next weekend