Style Of The Week 22/11/06 - Witbier

[neonmeate]

i'm wonedring if dry hopping with fresh coriander might give a nice light aroma without the pepperyness of the crushed seed.
Anyone tried it?

you mean the leaf?

 

[KoNG]

ok my raw wheat wit should be ready to be bottled over the weekend.
I'm planning on botling 15 Litres and racking the other 10 litres onto a few hundred grams of raspberries, should be a great beer for the champagne girls over christmas.

Another thing is the chamomile, when i transfered the no-chill to the ferm for pitching, the chamomile aroma coming from the cube was quite intense, but great. will be good to see how it lasts through fermentation. i used 15g of the real stuff in this one as compared to the crap from some teabags for the previous brew.

 

[tangent]

yeah neonmeate, just a bunch of fresh coriander leaves, no seed.
when i pick it, the smell on my hands is awesome, and that seems to be closer to the fresh Hoegaarden smell than the seed smell.

 

[KoNG]

they definately use crushed seed, ive seen the 'thirsty traveller' tip them in the hoegaarden kettle...

 

[tangent]

is that all they added other than peel?

 

[warrenlw63]

Tangent

Michael Jackson has alluded to them using Cumin (supposed secret ingredient). I've tried some myself in a wit before. Not without it's merits.

Warren -

 

[Weizguy]

yeah neonmeate, just a bunch of fresh coriander leaves, no seed.
when i pick it, the smell on my hands is awesome, and that seems to be closer to the fresh Hoegaarden smell than the seed smell.

Fresh leaves contain a lot of chlorophyll and other pigments. Your beer can turn out green or brown, or green/brown and have a lot a vegetal flavours.

By all means try it, but you'll prob only do it once.

Seth

 

[KoNG]

is that all they added other than peel?

thats all they show you.. :angry: :lol:
but the secret spice as warren suggests is said to be either cumin or maybe chamomile
who knows..... <_<

 

[warrenlw63]

When in doubt use a little bit of both.

Nothing wrong with {ahem} cumin in your wit. :lol:

Warren -

 

[tangent]

i have some cuacao liqueur, it's probably closer to curacao peel than sweet orange peel.
methinks it's time to split batches and experiment.

 

[Stuster]

Having had a monkey on my back about it, I've finally got round to posting my witbier experiences. I made a witbier two weeks ago using raw wheat. I decided on this after reading the witbier section in Radical Brewing. I milled the raw wheat grains.

3.75kg JW Export Pilsner
3.25kg Unmalted wheat
400g Oats
100g Weyermann Acidulated malt

For my sins, I did a cereal mash, using a 20L pot on the kitchen stove. Mashed in the raw wheat, the oats and 1kg of the pilsner at 50C. Rest for 20. Heat to 65C. Rest for 20. Boil for 20. Combine with main mash (2.725kg) already at 40C for sacc rest of 67C. (Had to add a couple of litres of cold water to get the temp right). Rest for 1 hour. Then drain, sparge etc. One difficulty with doing a cereal mash is that it tends to spit when it's up to boiling. You need to stir so get some protection. I sat the lid half on and sheltered behind it, stirring with a long spoon while wearing pink washing up gloves.

25g B Saaz (6.7%) @ 60
13g Styrian Goldings (4.6% plugs) @ 15
13g Styrian Goldings@ 5
15g Coriander seeds & 1 Orange rind & 5g Chamomile @ 5

OG 1052
IBU 14.8
EBC 6.6

I think the cereal mash helped with efficiency as I ended up with exactly the same efficiency as I normally get. Split the batch, 18L with T-58 dry yeast (thanks MHB) and 12L with some yeast cultured from a bottle of Forbidden Fruit. The FF yeast was not too well it seems and I've had to chuck that 12L. :angry: Still have 18L though to hopefully bottle tonight.

I'm not sure if I'd bother with it again, but good to have tried something different. Will post back with some tasting notes in a few weeks. (This post is not a challenge to your post-length prowess, PP.)

 

[tangent]

Fresh leaves contain a lot of chlorophyll and other pigments. Your beer can turn out green or brown, or green/brown and have a lot a vegetal flavours.

Like fresh hops?

I brewed a wit differently on NYE.
I used 2kg of raw wheat, so I did a cereal mash with just the wheat and oats and 200gm of Galaxy to start conversion. Did a stepped infusion with it 45-55-65, then used this to dough in with the malted wheat and pils malt.
Then step mashed 45-55-65. Got excellent conversion and a really easy sparge (although i did use ~200gms of rice gulls as well)
I'm a bit worried that my starch conversion was too good though as the runnings were very clear. Hopefully the yeast will add some haze.

Smelling great, just waiting for the 3944 to kick off. (underpitched)

 

[BoilerBoy]

G'day tangent,

Seems like alot of work for a wheat beer, (quickly grabs vomit bucket) :lol: h34r:

Happy new year and good luck with your wheat thing.

Cheers,
BB

 

[tangent]

great wheat beers are exceptional. ordinary ones are terrible.
I reckon it's worth the effort. heaps less effort than Dr.Gonzo's multiple decoctions

 

[Steve]

Going to try my first wheat on Saturday. How does this sound?:

Wheat Beer 20 IBUs

2.5kg Pilsener malt
2.5kg Wheat malt
250gms Carapils
250gms Rolled unmalted wheat
20gms crushed coriander seeds
20gms dried orange peel (curacao) or small jar bitter marmalade

Hallertaur Mittlefruh @ 60 mins to 20 ibus
15gms Saaz @ 15 mins
Whirlfloc @ 15 mins
Coriander @ 15 mins
Orange @ 15 mins

1 x K97 dry yeast

Cheers
Steve

 

[tangent]

keep a K97 or T58 (better) handy, but try like all hell to get a Belgian liquid yeast activated and ready to pitch by your brew day. It really does make a mile of difference.

 

[tangent]

i had to pitch a spare T-58 (i thought that was a soviet WW2 tank?) after my 3944 Belgian Wit failed to take off.
Got going pretty quickly and blew the top off the airlock (2-piece)

 

[Duff]

:lol:

Isn't it amazing what you can find on YouTube now.

 

[Steve]

Cheers Tangent - I couldnt decide between K97 and T58 because every other K97 has been dodgy and T58 is said to be spicy/clovey. I'll go the T58.
Steve

 

[tangent]

Isn't it amazing what you can find on YouTube now.

especially if you record it with your phone and upload it

I'd much rather the 3944 any day...if the fu<ker would bloody start!!! <_< :angry: I like the spice of T-58, it overlaps the coriander.

edit - I've also found 3g of coriander in the mash and 5g at 5mins to be more than enough. I'll drop it back to 3g and 3g.