In the Fermenter: My Wit's End

Since warm weather is almost here and my Pils won't be ready until late June, I decided a few weeks back to whip up one of my other favorite warm weather beers: Belgian Wit.

While I could just try and clone a commercial Wit and call it a day, I've decided to get experimental. First off, my local homebrew store was out of Unmalted Wheat, so I switched over to US White Wheat out of necessity. Also, I had a bunch of dried sweet orange peel from the grocery store in my cabinet. I decided to save some cash and use it instead of the usual bitter peel. Finally, I had yeast cultured from my Abbey Blonde in the fridge. I've been pleased with the spiciness it produces, so I ran with it rather than buying a liquid Wit strain. When all is said and done, I probably won't have a true traditional Wit. What I will have is a nice Summer beer.

Here's the five gallon recipe:

Grains:
4 lbs Castle Pilsen
4 lbs Rahr White Wheat
8 oz Flaked Oats

Hops:
1 oz Styrian Bobek (3.9% a.a.): 60 min
1 oz Styrian Bobek (3.9% a.a.): 7 min

Extras:
1 oz Crushed Coriander Seed: 10 min
1 oz Dried Sweet Orange Peel: 10 min

Total Boil Time:
90 min

Yeast:
Safbrew T-58

Mash Schedule:
Protein Rest: 124F for 20 min
Saccharification Rest: 149F for 60 min
Mashout: 168F for 15 minutes

Original Gravity:
1.051
Estimated Final Gravity:
1.012

IBU: 16
SRM Color: 3

Fermentation Schedule:
2 Weeks Primary
2 Weeks Secondary
2 Weeks Bottle Conditioning

Cost: $14 per case
Commercial Equivalent: Blue Moon Belgian White: $32
Savings: $18

Comments

In the Fermentor: Kitchen Sink Barleywine

The Leftovers It's time for a cleanup of leftover grains and partially used packets of hops from 2012. With the exception of the 2-Row base malt, everything in the recipe below has been sitting on the shelf, or in the fridge waiting to be used. I had several open hop packages, some leftover toasted malts and a half-full bottle of malt extract too. I also had yeast cultured from my White House Honey Porter . My decision was to use almost all of my leftovers and make a partial-mash Barleywine. The finished beer will be quite strong and quite bitter. A toasted malt backbone should nicely complement pine, spice and citrus hop flavors. Because of the beer's strength, it will not be ready for at least three months and should improve with age. The recipe has been scaled up to five gallons from the 2.5 gallons I actually brewed: Grains: 9 lbs Rahr 2-Row 8.5 oz Victory 7.5 oz Brown Hops: Bittering: 0.75 oz Chinook (11.1% a.a.): 60 min 0.5 oz Colum...

In the Fermentor: Flaming Pumpkin

I'll admit that I'm not a huge Pumpkin Beer fan. I didn't have one on my brewing calendar for this year and didn't have my sights set on one for next Fall either. Then my niece came along and threw down the gauntlet. She asked me to brew her a pumpkin beer and I accepted the challenge. I did a lot of reading to see how to best go about using pumpkin in beer. Some people mash it with the grains. Others add it to the brew kettle during the boil. Some add it to the primary or secondary fermentor. The consensus from professional brewers appears to be adding it to the mash, so I took the same approach. The pumpkin was cooked ahead of time by my girlfriend to soften it, convert some of the starch and help release some of its sugars. It then joined the grains in the mash. I really want the pumpkin pie effect here, so I've thrown in all of the requisite spices toward the end of the boil. I've also gone with just enough bitterness to balance the sweetness of the ...

Out of the Bottle: Insert clever use of the word Wit here

My latest Wit was a hit at my friend's birthday party. He especially liked the beer's citrus components. Others found it to be light and refreshing. I heard no Blue Moon comparisons, which actually made me quite happy. Compared to My Wit's End , this beer is much closer to style. Unmalted Wheat is part of the reason, as there's much less grainy sweetness at work. Instead, the beer is crisp and dry. The bitter orange peel really does its thing. The peel's sharp flavor melds nicely with the sweet orange peel I also used. Coriander pushes the beer's spicy character along. If I were to change anything, it would be to dial it back a notch or two. Some light sourdough aromas round out the flavor and aroma. Despite the relatively low ABV of right around 5.0%, the beer sports a fairly hefty body. Overall, I'm quite happy with this Wit. Next time, I'll hold back on the coriander. Maybe I will even take a shot at a Turbid Mash, which sounds like a great sub...

Colorado Kitchen Brew

Search This Blog