Time for a wheat beer

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brew4allMI

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Hey brewers.

I have brewed one wheat beer in the past and it didnt turn out with the citrus flavors I liked. I used otwo hop additions of saaz and dried sweet orange zest for ten minutes.

My New recipe that I have come up with uses citrusy Amarillo hops (.5 oz 60m, .25oz 15m, and .25 oz 1m) With 2 tbs fresh orange zest @ 10 minutes. I am hoping the amarillo and orange zest work well together..

Recipe
http://hopville.com/recipe/1684222

Any thoughts or comments?
 
I use 1 oz. of Amarillio hops in the American Hefe I brew for my wife. .5 oz at 60 minutes, and .5 oz at 10 minutes. The light citrus that comes through with the Amarillo hops is pretty tasty. It's not as harsh as something like the grapefruit like Cascade or the even citusier (is that even a word? LOL) Centennial.

Gary
 
Amarillo is delicious in a wheat beer. I make something similar to this more often than any other beer. http://www.brew365.com/beer_three_floyds_gumballhead.php


IMO I would do a few things.

Increase the late Amarillo additions, and decrease the number of specialty malts. I'd drop the honey to .25 lbs if you do keep it.

Also, I would consider using fresh zest(make sure not to use any pith) if you want a fresh orange flavor. Anywhere from 1-2oz at flameout would be appropriate.

Using a neutral ale yeast as opposed to a hefe or wit yeast will also help the orange come through, if that's what you are looking for.

FWIW, I just did a RYEIPA with grapefruit zest for an upcoming grapefruit zest competition and used a bunch of Amarillo and Citra. The beer turned out very well.
 
GASoline71 said:
I use 1 oz. of Amarillio hops in the American Hefe I brew for my wife. .5 oz at 60 minutes, and .5 oz at 10 minutes. The light citrus that comes through with the Amarillo hops is pretty tasty. It's not as harsh as something like the grapefruit like Cascade or the even citusier (is that even a word? LOL) Centennial.

Gary
Click to expand...

Thanks for the info.. Sounds like i am on the right track. Do you use orange zest? what yeast do you normally use? I was going to use am. Hefe ale. wlp 320.. i was reading about it and it provides less clover/banana character.. i like citrusier.. lol. I need a wheat beer to get me through this crappy spring we are having in MI.
 
No orange zest in mine. I usually use Wyeast 1010, which imparts little to no banana or clove in the beer. This time I used WLP320. Wanted to try it to see how it compares to the 1010.

Gary
 
Xpertskir said:
Amarillo is delicious in a wheat beer. I make something similar to this more often than any other beer. http://www.brew365.com/beer_three_floyds_gumballhead.php


IMO I would do a few things.

Increase the late Amarillo additions, and decrease the number of specialty malts. I'd drop the honey to .25 lbs if you do keep it.

Also, I would consider using fresh zest(make sure not to use any pith) if you want a fresh orange flavor. Anywhere from 1-2oz at flameout would be appropriate.

Using a neutral ale yeast as opposed to a hefe or wit yeast will also help the orange come through, if that's what you are looking for.

FWIW, I just did a RYEIPA with grapefruit zest for an upcoming grapefruit zest competition and used a bunch of Amarillo and Citra. The beer turned out very well.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the additional info. I was looking at the honey malt and was wondering if i should decrease it a little since the other caramel malt of caravienne will add a lot of sweetness. What do you mean a neutral ale yeast? 1010 or 1056 maybe? I was going to use fresh orange peel thinking at least 5 min in boil to pasturize it... afraid of infection?
 
brew4allMI said:
Ohh alright...is this an all grain or partial or extract? grains used?
Click to expand...

I have done it both ways...

Extract (off the top of my head):

Boiling 4 gallons for a 5 gallon batch (top off in fermenter)

6l bs. Wheat Malt Extract (half at the beginning of boil, and the other half at 20 minutes left in boil.)

1 lb. Flaked Wheat (steep)
.5 lb Victory Malt (steep)

.5 Amarillo (60 min)
.5 Amarillo (2 min)

Wyeast 1010

All grain:

boiling 6.5 gallons for a 5 gallon batch

5 lbs 2-row
4 lbs White Wheat Malt
1 lb Flaked Wheat
.5 lb Rice Hulls

.5 oz Amarillo (60 min)
.5 oz Amarillo (10 min)

Wyeast 1010

But this last AG batch I just did on this past friday, and used WLP320. So I will know how it turned out in a couple more weeks.

Gary
 
Ok, let me first say that there is no "right answer" just a lot of different paths that will get you close to where you want to be.


If it were me I would do the following(for extract)

Use the wheat LME to get to your gravity low 1050's
and then .25 lbs of honey(any more than a half pound in a lighter beer would be too much)

Munich needs help converting, so I wouldn't use it unless you are going to PM(which is a different discussion)
I would also lose the cara malt because extract already has a component of crystal and/or cara in it to begin with.


I would bitter to 15-25 ibu's at 60 min

Then a hop addition at 15 and
one at flameout with 1.5(2 if you want) oz of orange zest(no pith) I would let the wort sit for 10-30 minutes prior to chilling.


I would use the chico strain(1056, 001, 05, whatever) because with extract its often hard to get the attenuation you want and wyeast 1010 wont get you as low as chico. IMO you are going to want to be at anywhere from 1010-1012, but not much higher for this style, but there is room for a lot of personal preference on this point.



I would also dry hop with 1-2 oz more of hops. If you want more orange flavor, you use more orange zest when you boil your sugar for bottling. Be careful here, I'm guessing 1.5-2 oz at flameout will get it done, especially once its carbed and the yeast drops out.


If your goal is a flavorful wheat beer with focus on orange, the above should get you there.

:mug:
 
1--2 grams of coriander will provide a nice citrus flavor to the beer as well and is typical in most weizen style beers
 
Xpertskir said:
Ok, let me first say that there is no "right answer" just a lot of different paths that will get you close to where you want to be.


If it were me I would do the following(for extract)

Use the wheat LME to get to your gravity low 1050's
and then .25 lbs of honey(any more than a half pound in a lighter beer would be too much)

Munich needs help converting, so I wouldn't use it unless you are going to PM(which is a different discussion)
I would also lose the cara malt because extract already has a component of crystal and/or cara in it to begin with.


I would bitter to 15-25 ibu's at 60 min

Then a hop addition at 15 and
one at flameout with 1.5(2 if you want) oz of orange zest(no pith) I would let the wort sit for 10-30 minutes prior to chilling.


I would use the chico strain(1056, 001, 05, whatever) because with extract its often hard to get the attenuation you want and wyeast 1010 wont get you as low as chico. IMO you are going to want to be at anywhere from 1010-1012, but not much higher for this style, but there is room for a lot of personal preference on this point.



I would also dry hop with 1-2 oz more of hops. If you want more orange flavor, you use more orange zest when you boil your sugar for bottling. Be careful here, I'm guessing 1.5-2 oz at flameout will get it done, especially once its carbed and the yeast drops out.


If your goal is a flavorful wheat beer with focus on orange, the above should get you there.

:mug:
Click to expand...

I think your suggestions will work. I would have never thought to dry hop an american wheat beer? I think it may work though especially since citus tones are what I am after. I should go for a high attenuating yeast for this beer? Your input is great. thanks again...
 
The WLP320 I used for this batch damn near blew the top of my bucket off last night. That's with a blow odd tube already installed. Yesterday morning I notice a little junk in the airlock, so I installed a blowoff tube. By 8pm last night the blow off was going crazy, and the top of the bucket was actually bulging. :D Never had a Wheat yeast strain ferement this furious. Pretty cool... :ban:

Gary
 
stvo said:
^^^^ Would definitely like to try this recipe, is the first wort hop addition a mash hop??
I know one of the Pliny recipes calls for something like that. Thanks for the recipe!
Click to expand...

mash hopping is just a less efficient FWH, IMO mash hopping is a waste.

just toss the FWH in the dry kettle before you collect your first runnings and away you go.
 
Personally I would stick with your original recipe as you listed it since that is what you came up with, and it looks pretty decent. You can modify it from there on subsequent brews. The only changes I make is change the Munich malt to "steep" rather than mash in the hopville settings to get a more accurate final ABV estimate (it defaults to mash but I'm pretty sure you're not doing a half pound mash for a 5 gallon batch) and I'd add the orange zest much closer to flameout because the aromatic oils that give you the flavor are highly volatile so will mostly burn off in 10 minutes of boil.
 
Xpertskir said:
mash hopping is just a less efficient FWH, IMO mash hopping is a waste.

just toss the FWH in the dry kettle before you collect your first runnings and away you go.
Click to expand...

Thanks!!!!!
 

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