Raspberry Honey Wheat

[muddy1015]

Trying out a raspberry honey wheat recipe from Beersmith, I brewed it yesterday, just thought I would share it and the results since it involves both honey & fruit which are much debated topics

Amt Name Type # %/IBU
8.0 oz Rice Hulls (0.0 SRM) Adjunct 1 5.3 %
3 lbs 4.0 oz Pale Malt (2 Row) US (2.0 SRM) Grain 2 34.2 %
3 lbs 4.0 oz Wheat Malt, Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 3 34.2 %
8.0 oz Caramel/Crystal Malt - 40L (40.0 SRM) Grain 4 5.3 %

0.50 oz Liberty [3.90 %] - Boil 80.0 min Hop 5 9.6 IBUs
0.50 oz Liberty [3.90 %] - Boil 10.0 min Hop 6 3.3 IBUs

1.0 pkg Safbrew Wheat (DCL/Fermentis #WB-06) [50.28 ml] Yeast 7 -

2 lbs Orange Blossom Honey
4 lbs frozen red raspberries

First time using the wb-06, I had some wlp300 yeast stored but accidentally pitched it into hot starter wort the night before so...that's dead, got the wb06 on sale for $2 at the HBS! I added the honey in at high krausen (did not pasteurize, just warmed up a bit with water to get better flow) and just added in the raspberries at the end of high krausen in primary (no sanitation of these either, going all out on the theories for honey & frozen fruit being ok to add in as is.

For the record adding raspberries into a carboy is weirdly difficult/annoying, I ended up sanitizing a sheet of aluminum foil and making a makeshift funnel around the carboy opening.

I'm very intrigued by the combo of hefeweizen yeast (keeping <68F to suppress banana flavor ) with orange blossom honey and raspberries. Could end up being a disaster, but it'll be a good experiment!

I'll post updates on how it turns out, hoping to turn around in bottles for Christmas day

 

[muddy1015]

One other note, this is my first time using honey and getting it figured in beersmith was a bit of a challenge. I mostly just wanted to figure out if I was hitting numbers correctly, etc. so I took honey out of the recipe as my 'og' and then added it back in for the og for calculating abv purposes. I will use the recipe with honey added in beersmith to estimate where the fg should be at

 

[muddy1015]

Well for those who come across this in the futuree -> took a tasting/reading today (Wednesday, pitched last Friday) and it's at 1.014 and has an unreal reddish color to it. The taste is good right now, the raspberry aroma/taste is too much at this point though, I'm thinking those will diminish a bit with time but I've never used fruit so I guess we will see. Beersmith's est FG is 1.009 so we're close, I'm hoping for this to finish fermenting by end of Friday so I can give it enough time in a bottle to carb before Christmas!

 

[BierGut]

Sounds good. Should be a very merry Christmas for you. I recently bought a case of Southern Tiers Raspberry Wheat and when blended 50/50 with Left Hands Fade to Black Stout it was a raspberry chocolate delight. Keep that in mind if it turns out too tart, blend it with another beer and see what you get.

 

[muddy1015]

Oo thanks for the thought, that sounds pretty fantastic

 

[muddy1015]

Just to update, I bottled yesterday - the FG was 1.009 (beersmith was right on). The raspberry flavor was pretty strong still, hoping it will keep mellowing out in the bottle. We'll see if these are carbed up and ready by xmas. If the raspberry stays too strong I have a chocolate stout I just made maybe I'll try BierGut's suggestion and mix those together with a few bottles and see how it turns out

 

[billspudley]

View attachment ImageUploadedByHome Brew1487387946.014559.jpgRaspberry Hefe. It was sooooo good.