Beer Forum

Hi all,

I am looking to brew an amber pumpkin ale and most of the recipes I find use 6-row in them. I'm an American that lives in England and have not been able to find any 6-row on the UK brewing supplies websites, unless they call it something else over here. Would there be a good substitution for it that I could use instead?

Thanks

Conan

Most of those recipes are probably calling for 6 row due to its high protein content and diastatic power for converting starches into sugars. They are assuming that the 6 row will help with conversion of the pumpkin pulp. The basic brewers 2 row malt today will have no problem being substituted for the 6 row in your basic pumpkin recipe and will have enough diastatic power to convert the pumpkin in the mash if needed.

If you do the calculations and you need some more DP in your grain bill, you can sub wheat malt for some of the 2 row.
You should not be able to taste that much difference in a pumpkin ale, whereas it may actually add a little malt complexity under all the spices.

Wheat & rye have high dp in the same range as 6 row.

HTH-

Hey Bdawg! How would you do calculations for the pumpkin? Any ideas?

brewinhard wrote:Hey Bdawg! How would you do calculations for the pumpkin? Any ideas?

I'd assume it's 0 DP and is pure starch.

Even after properly baking in the oven before adding to the mash?

brewinhard wrote:Even after properly baking in the oven before adding to the mash?

Then 0 DP & pure baked starch.