There is no shortage of pumpkin beer on the market this time of the season for adventurous beer drinkers. Pumpkin style ales and lagers originated in the U.S. by micro-breweries looking to put the flavors of pumpkin pie into a bottle. The flavor of pumpkin beer is delicate pumpkin usually overpowered by traditional pumpkin pie spice mix. The aroma has a nice spiciness, perhaps a little malt and balanced by a little sweetness. Some brewers add caramel malt which adds some interest and going even further with pumpkin they actually malt pumpkin seeds and use them in the mashing process.

Pumpkin spice ales and lagers are the most common styles of this gourd-like brew, but the Saison style seems to have some peppery spice undertones that could aid in this beers overall balance. The normal gravity range for Pumpkin ale is 1.047-1.056 with an ABV range of 4.9-5.5%. Bitterness is low on this beer around 10-15 IBU with color 6-12L and attenuation medium. The normal gravity for a traditional Saison is 1.055-1.080 with ABV range of 4.5-8.1%. Bitterness is medium to high on this beer around 20-45 IBU with color 6-12L and attenuation super dry.

By blending together these two styles we arrive at some interesting results. The additions of pumpkin and brown sugar gives the yeast more sugars to convert to alcohol making this brew on the higher end of the ABV and Lovibond scale for the Saison style. The White Labs Platinum Saison II yeast WLP566 is moderately phenolic, with a clove-like characteristic and aroma. The pumpkin plays nice with the fruity ester production of this yeast.

To add another layer of complexity to this beer's body I smoked the pumpkin in my wood smoker. I chose Alderwood (SmokerWoodChunks.com) for one of the smoothest, real wood smoke flavors available. Smoking 3-7 lbs of pumpkin at temperatures of 250-300F took around 3 hours. Using 5-20% pumpkin in your recipe is a nice rule of thumb when dealing in squashy fermentables. The addition of pumpkin in the mash, whether it be from a can or freshly cooked, may increase viscosity, causing runoffs in the grain bed. Adding rice hulls to the mash is recommended when lautering with pumpkin to provide bulk and help prevent the mash from settling and becoming stuck during the sparge.

The spicing mixtures vary for pumpkin beers, but normally are made up of cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, cloves, anise or ginger. The spices can be added at the end of the boil or they can be added during secondary fermentation (dry hop).

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