So I just brewed my first german hefe. The recipe was 5.5# wheat, 4# pilsner, 1 oz tettnang at 60. I kegged it yesterday and noticed its big banana and clove nose and flavor profile. I saved the yeast cake because it got me thinking about the pumpkin beer my wife has been asking me to brew. Do you think I could use that yeast flavor profile with a stout and add a bit more spice to give me the pumpkin flavor? If so, how should I transform my original hefe recipe to a pumpkin stout?
You could add any of a number of darker grains to make it a stout. Look through the stout/porter kits NB sells for ideas. Read the description of the grains to see where you might want to go.
Off the top of my head: chocolate, roasted barley, black patent, debittered, and…
Add some pumpkin spice to the boil. Or skip it and soak it in 3-4oz of vodka. Then add 1-2 oz after fermentation is done. Before bottling/kegging, taste it to see if you want to add some additional vodka.
