Hi All.
My buddy and I spent the day yesterday brewing a batch of Belgian Wit. We based it off of the White Guy Wit recipe in Radical Brewing, although we did 18oz of Oatmeal as opposed to 16oz, and we added 6oz of carapils in the primary mash (the recipe calls for an adjunct mash which is then added to the primary mash). The original recipe cited an OG of 1.052, yet we ended with an OG of 1.062. Could it be possible that we had a really good efficiency, or is it likely something else?
The one thing I was wondering, is that in the book, he mentions adding a tablespoon of flour with 5 min left in the boil to preserve haze in the finished product. We decided to do this to give it that classic belgian wit haziness. Could this have driven the OG up so drastically? I know gravity measures dissolved solids, so this had to affect it, but I couldn't imagine it would be so severe.
The other thing I was curious about is that we ended up having a stuck sparge (even though we used rice hulls), and had to dump everything into a pot, fix the strainer in the mash tun that had crushed, and ended up using more water than expected to sparge (I batch sparge, fyi). Could this have resulted in more sugars in the final wort? It was a 90 min boil (as the recipe calls for), and we ended up with slightly less than 5 gal, so I feel that the pre-boil volume was fine. The consistency, color, and taste all seem great, it just seems high for the recipe (and the style).
Anyway, this is only my 5th AG batch, so I'm really not sure where to trouble-shoot. I've included the recipe for reference, and any insight would be appreciated. Thanks!
Recipe
Adjunct Mash
3# Flaked, unmalted wheat
2# American 6-row
18oz Whole Cut Oats
1.25qt/lb, Protein Rest for 15min@122F, Sacharification rest for 15min@150F, Boil for 15min and add to Primary Mash
Primary Mash
3# Bavarian Pilsner Malt
1# Munich Malt
6oz Carapils
1.25qt/lb, Dough in for 30min@98F, Protein Rest for 30min@122F, Add boiling adjunct mash to bring overall mash to 155F for 45min. Add partial boiling sparge water to bring temp to 165F for mash-out. Final sparge at 170F. Pre-Boil volume of 7 gal.
.5oz Northern Brewer Pellet @90min (8%AA)
1oz Tettnanger Pellet @30min (5.1%AA)
1oz Tettnanger Pellet @5min (5.1%AA)
.5oz Whole Corriander (lightly crushed) @5min
.25oz Whole Leaf Chamomile @5min
1.5 Orange Peel (Valencia) @5min
1T White flour @5min
My buddy and I spent the day yesterday brewing a batch of Belgian Wit. We based it off of the White Guy Wit recipe in Radical Brewing, although we did 18oz of Oatmeal as opposed to 16oz, and we added 6oz of carapils in the primary mash (the recipe calls for an adjunct mash which is then added to the primary mash). The original recipe cited an OG of 1.052, yet we ended with an OG of 1.062. Could it be possible that we had a really good efficiency, or is it likely something else?
The one thing I was wondering, is that in the book, he mentions adding a tablespoon of flour with 5 min left in the boil to preserve haze in the finished product. We decided to do this to give it that classic belgian wit haziness. Could this have driven the OG up so drastically? I know gravity measures dissolved solids, so this had to affect it, but I couldn't imagine it would be so severe.
The other thing I was curious about is that we ended up having a stuck sparge (even though we used rice hulls), and had to dump everything into a pot, fix the strainer in the mash tun that had crushed, and ended up using more water than expected to sparge (I batch sparge, fyi). Could this have resulted in more sugars in the final wort? It was a 90 min boil (as the recipe calls for), and we ended up with slightly less than 5 gal, so I feel that the pre-boil volume was fine. The consistency, color, and taste all seem great, it just seems high for the recipe (and the style).
Anyway, this is only my 5th AG batch, so I'm really not sure where to trouble-shoot. I've included the recipe for reference, and any insight would be appreciated. Thanks!
Recipe
Adjunct Mash
3# Flaked, unmalted wheat
2# American 6-row
18oz Whole Cut Oats
1.25qt/lb, Protein Rest for 15min@122F, Sacharification rest for 15min@150F, Boil for 15min and add to Primary Mash
Primary Mash
3# Bavarian Pilsner Malt
1# Munich Malt
6oz Carapils
1.25qt/lb, Dough in for 30min@98F, Protein Rest for 30min@122F, Add boiling adjunct mash to bring overall mash to 155F for 45min. Add partial boiling sparge water to bring temp to 165F for mash-out. Final sparge at 170F. Pre-Boil volume of 7 gal.
.5oz Northern Brewer Pellet @90min (8%AA)
1oz Tettnanger Pellet @30min (5.1%AA)
1oz Tettnanger Pellet @5min (5.1%AA)
.5oz Whole Corriander (lightly crushed) @5min
.25oz Whole Leaf Chamomile @5min
1.5 Orange Peel (Valencia) @5min
1T White flour @5min
