Black Wit Beer

[black_labb]

I had a great Ukrainian beer while over there, Cherniviski Bine Nich (or something like that, it's in hyroglyphics). Has anyone tried it? Tried to do something similar?

The beer was really enjoyable. It was essentially a Wit beer with a touch of roasty flavours and licorice. The coriander, citrus and licorice/aniseed are the main flavours in it. As with most wit's it is light, fluffy and refreshing despite the darker brown cloudy sludge look about it (think of a brown ale that is a cloudy as a good wit).

Firstly has anyone tried it (I haven't seen it outside of Ukraine or Moldova so this may be a bit of a longshot). And secondly has anyone tried to brew anything similar? here is the ratebeer link, but it is obvious that some peoples bottles were not as fresh as they could be. http://www.ratebeer.com/beer/chernigivske-...nich/36608/1/1/

Recipe wise I'm thinking I'm going to essentially take a Wit recipe and add some Choc (choc -rye?), a touch of Carawheat and something for the aniseed flavour. I'll probably add a bit more oats than usual unless I can get my hands on some unmalted wheat. I've got some forbidden fruit yeast on hand so I'll use that.

What would you reccomend for the licorice flavour? Would you reccomend some aniseed and possibly licorice root? I have a friend that does a great kits and bits licorice stout with a fair chunk of citra that just uses soft eating licorice in the fermentor for the flavour. This could be a pretty good method as well. The way I brew double batches I could easily try each method in the different cubes, but I wouldn't mind doing one half as a normal Wit.


Here is what I am thinking, please tell me what you think. I'm thinking I will up the choc rye a bit and maybe a bit more cara wheat as well but I'm not sure yet

Recipe Specs
----------------
Batch Size (L): 40.0
Total Grain (kg): 7.700
Total Hops (g): 50.00
Original Gravity (OG): 1.044 (P): 11.0
Final Gravity (FG): 1.011 (P): 2.8
Alcohol by Volume (ABV): 4.32 %
Colour (SRM): 17.4 (EBC): 34.2
Bitterness (IBU): 17.4 (Average)
Brewhouse Efficiency (%): 75
Boil Time (Minutes): 60

Grain Bill
----------------
2.500 kg Pilsner (32.47%)
2.500 kg Wheat Malt (32.47%)
1.000 kg Flaked Oats (12.99%)
1.000 kg Pale Ale Malt (12.99%)
0.400 kg Chocolate Rye (5.19%)
0.300 kg Cara wheat (3.9%)

Hop Bill
----------------
25.0 g Spalt Pellet (8% Alpha) @ 60 Minutes (Boil) (0.6 g/L)
25.0 g Styrian Golding Pellet (4% Alpha) @ 15 Minutes (Boil) (0.6 g/L)

Misc Bill
----------------
50g Coriander seed into cube
60g orange peel into cube

??? Star anise
??? licorice root if at all

??? eating licorice

Single step Infusion at 63C for 75 Minutes.
Fermented at 20C with Wyeast 3463 - Forbidden Fruit


Recipe Generated with BrewMate

 

[bullsneck]

Gordon Strong has a recipe for a Black Wit in his book 'Brewing Better Beer'. I haven't brewed or tasted it, but you might like to see if you can locate it and compare it to your recipe.

 

[freezkat]

Gordon Strong has a recipe for a Black Wit in his book 'Brewing Better Beer'. I haven't brewed or tasted it, but you might like to see if you can locate it and compare it to your recipe.

you could toast some malt with anise oil or crush some anise candy into a sugar.

 

[Malted]

Lots of options available for flavours in that ballpark, here is just a few. They are not all the same, it just depends on the angle you might want:

Sarsaparilla:
(1) I got some ground Sarsaparilla root and it had next to no flavour.
(2) Concentrated soft drink extract is fantastic. Here's an example :http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/Sarsparilla-Soft-Drink-Extract-Make-4-Gallons-Soda-/150305831073?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item22feecf8a1.

Aniseed:
(1) whole star anise bought from an Asian supermarket (even a lot of Coles and Woollies have them too). They are easy/large enough to fish out of the brew. I have heard of folks soaking them in a bit of vodka for a few days so the essential oils etc can be extracted, then dump the lot into the fermenter later in the brewing stage. CO2 during peak fermentation can drive off some flavours and aromas - hence putting things like this into the brew when fermentation is almost complete.
(2) buy a bottle of Pernod/Pastis, mix it with cold water at a ratio of about 1 part spirit to 5 parts water, drink and enjoy. Maybe even put a dribble of the spirit into the fermenter during secondary or late in primary if you don't do secondary.

Liquorice:
(1) buy some ground liquorice root powder from an online herb store etc, I got some and it was very flavoursome. It can leave gritty fines in the beer though. Or from Craftbrewer with larger particles: http://www.craftbrewer.com.au/shop/details.asp?PID=2902
(2) some homebrew stores sell bottles of liquorice extract (generally for stouts) eg Grain and Grape: http://www.grainandgrape.com.au/product_info.php?cPath=1_39_40&products_id=7486

Root beer extract:
(1) Craftbrewer for example has liquid extract: http://www.craftbrewer.com.au/shop/details.asp?PID=2899
(2) Heaps available on eBay.


Heaps of these sorts of soda extracts available on eBay.

 

[black_labb]

Just found this recipe. Searching black wit didn't help but it seems that the americans tend to use the word witbier and there are a couple recipes online. this one seems to be what I am after. Theres a great indian spice shop nearby that I've gone to a few times for different things, and they should have some star anise which will work well. My main issue with the anise was that I didn't know how much to use, but with the recipe I'll be fine.

http://www.byo.com/stories/article/indices...n-black-witbier


I'm still going to use the choc rye and the cara wheat instead of the dark malts in the recipe above, but I'm just happy to see something along the lines of what I'm brewing so I have the right proportions.

edit: Seems that is the gordon strong recipe

 

[Wolfy]

There is also a Midnight Wit beer recipe in last August's BYO mag, using Midnite Wheat for the black colour.

 

[peas_and_corn]

Yeah, dark wheat malt is really good for this sort of style.