Small Saison Batch Help

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BrewerMikey

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Just finished my first Saison batch and hope to use this as a baseline to make improvements. It was just a small batch as a test.
The attached BeerSmith photo is nearly exactly how I put it together. The taste of the wort seems a little on the light side and is dry, but won't know until the bottle conditioning is complete in 3 or 4 weeks.
If you have suggestions for changes to my Hop schedule or grain bill feel free to post a note or a PM. The FG is sitting at 1.010 right now.

beer smith saison.jpg
 
Saisons are typically extremely dry, getting their sweetness and fruit flavors from the yeast exclusively. What are you looking for?
 
When I tasted the wort on bottling day, the nose was fruity/sweet with a smooth honey aroma. The taste was somewhat watery or maybe that was just how I perceived the dryness of the wort and this was only 10 days in Primary. I assume that my long rest at 148 is what facilitated the dry feeling the wort delivered on bottling day. I have never tasted a commercial Saison so I don't have a comparison. Also I only have access to Fermentis yeasts, more specifically a choice between S-33 and T-58 and decided on T-58. Would changing the bittering addition from Saaz to Hallertau or Tettneg have a significant impact on flavor, or is a Saison so heavily driven by the yeast strain that varying the bittering addition won't have an impact? Next, I didn't have raw wheat so used Chateau Wheat Blanc. Is there a big difference between the two regarding head retention?
- Thank you
 
If you have access to bottles of Saison Dupont, I would harvest the yeast from those. There are tons of threads on the yeast forum on how that's done. The yeast they use will give you a very nice saison, much better and drier than T-58 for my taste. To answer your question, changing the bittering hop within your choices won't alter much. Changing the styrians for any of the others you mentioned would. Any type of wheat will aid in head retention. White wheat malt has a ton of starch-eating enzymes, whereas flaked has none, so using white wheat might lead to a slightly lower FG, although in the amounts used in your recipe, there'd be close to no difference.
 

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