I tried many pumpkin ales and never acquired a taste for them until I had one at Turkey Hill Brewing in Bloomsburg Pa. All others were like a mouth full of spices. This one, ahhhh, tasted like pumpkin. That being said, are there any pumpkin ale recipes out there that have a very minimum amount of spices? As a home brewer for over 20 years I have never brewed a pumpkin beer because they never appealed to me. Now I want to. So for starters, what kind of pumpkin do I use. Do I peel it. Do I pre cook it. Mash it or just cut into chunks? Do I put it in the boil, if so for how long. Or do I dump the pumpkin in the fermentation? Im guessing a straight up ale recipe is a good foundation for this, or maybe not! Ill welcome all or any tips. Thanks.
In Radical Brewing, p. 262, Randy Mosher has a historical Colonial ale recipe that uses 60% malt and, as adjuncts, equal parts corn, pumpkin and turnips. The pumpkin and turnips are baked/roasted. No spices as such, just hops and walnut leaves or bark. (No wonder cider and rum were so popular in Colonial America…)
My personal spice mix for 6 gal of pumpkin beer is: 15 g dried ginger, 10 g whole cloves, 5 g stick cinnamon, 5 g cracked nutmeg. That’s much less than most recipes will suggest, but probably still needs to be dialed in to your personal preferences.
As far as actually handling the pumpkin, I just use the canned stuff (without spices) and dump it in the mash. It contributes some color that way, but I don’t really think you can get much flavor out of the pumpkin itself no matter what you do.