Would this work as a Wit?

[WishboneBrewery]

This is based loosely around a GW recipe for Hoegarden but I don't fancy the Orange & Coriander. (Well maybe a touch of Coriander but no Orange)

Wits End

Fermentables:
Lager Malt 72%
Flaked Wheat 19%
Aromatic Malt 5%
Flaked Oats 4%

Hop Variety Type Alpha Time lb: oz grams Ratio
Golding Whole 5.7 % 60 mins 0 lbs. 0.3 oz 8 grams 25%
Saaz Whole 3.3 % 60 mins 0 lbs. 0.3 oz 8 grams 25%
Saaz Whole 3.3 % 15 mins 0 lbs. 0.5 oz 16 grams 50%

Final Volume: 12 Litres
Original Gravity: 1.048
Final Gravity: 1.011
Alcohol Content: 4.8% ABV
Total Liquor: 18.9 Litres
Mash Liquor: 6.7 Litres
Mash Efficiency: 75 %
Bitterness: 19 EBU
Colour: 8 EBC

Would ferment with something from Whitelabs

[Barley Water]

If you put a touch of coriander in there, you will get the orange taste. The orange peel actually just adds to the bitterness and aroma, it really doesn't make for orange flavor per se. Actually, if you don't like the orange flavor, why not try making another kind of wheat beer, maybe a heffe or perhaps an American wheat beer. Neither of those two styles tastes of orange and especially with the American wheat beer, the style afords quite a bit of latitude.

If however you really want to do a wit, I would consider jacking up the percentage of wheat you are using, maybe pretty close to 50% (it can be a combination of malted and raw wheat). By the way, the addition of oats is a really good idea, it will help give you the cloudy beer you want while at the same time making the mouthfeel really silky (also, it adds to the farmhouse effect with all those different grains, you know, brew with whatever you can scrounge up). I think wits are a pretty difficult style to do well, I have had many homebrewed examples that for some reason just miss the mark. Anyhow, take all that for what it's worth and make something interesting (and have fun).

[WishboneBrewery]

So the 'Farmhouse Effect', is this a desirable element of a Good Wit?
I've not got enough Flaked Wheat to do 50%, best I could do is to bulk it up with Torrefied Wheat & Wheat Malt.

[Barley Water]

Of course, it's a Belgian beer so you can "get your freak on" as they say. By all means, go ahead and add some malted wheat, actually it might be just slightly easier to deal with than the flaked stuff. Most of these types of beers were originally done on the farm and back in those days, nothing was standardized. The Belgians are pretty much the only major brewing nation that has not moderized across the board so some of the old traditions are still alive and well. What that means is that you can do pretty much whatever strikes your fancy so if you think it will taste good, go ahead and give it a try.

[adm]

I think using some oats would be a great idea.

The last wheat beer I did was a hefeweiss using plain 50/50 wheat malt and lager malt IIRC and it was (still is - and is my best Weiss/Wit so far) very good. BUT the colour is an almost luminous pi55 yellow which isn't really right - so personally I would add something to darken it a bit more to the more typical German colouring. Maybe 5-10% Munich. The oats would really add something to both the mouthfeel and the cloudiness, so maybe for my next one I will go 45% lager malt, 45% wheat malt, 5% oats, 5% Munich.

I think that would work pretty well. Then add spices and a Belgian Wit yeast for a Wit type, or no spices and the Wiehenstephan weiss yeast for a more German profile.

[WishboneBrewery]

I'm planning a German Wheat beer as well, but at the moment both a reliant on me resurrecting some WLP500 from a split in the fridge and culturing up some Schneider Weisse Yeast from the bottle (Just to stop me spending money I should be spending on other things)

The Plegmish!

Code: Select all

Wits End

Fermentable	Colour	lb: oz	Grams	Ratio
Lager Malt	2.5 EBC	7 lbs. 15.2 oz	3610 grams	56%
Flaked Wheat	0 EBC	1 lbs. 15.8 oz	900 grams	14%
Torrefied Wheat	4 EBC	1 lbs. 15.8 oz	900 grams	14%
Wheat Malt	3.5 EBC	0 lbs. 15.9 oz	450 grams	7%
Flaked Oats	0 EBC	0 lbs. 11.2 oz	320 grams	5%
Aromatic Malt	55 EBC	0 lbs. 9.1 oz	260 grams	4%

Hop Variety	Type	Alpha	Time	lb: oz	grams	Ratio
Golding	Whole	5.7 %	60 mins	0 lbs. 0.6 oz	17 grams	25%
Saaz	Whole	3.3 %	60 mins	0 lbs. 0.6 oz	17 grams	25%
Saaz	Whole	3.3 %	15 mins	0 lbs. 1.2 oz	34 grams	50%

Final Volume:	23	Litres
Original Gravity:	1.060	
Final Gravity:	1.014	
Alcohol Content:	6%	ABV
Total Liquor:	34.8	Litres
Mash Liquor:	16.1	Litres
Mash Efficiency:	75	%
Bitterness:	19	EBU
Colour:	9	EBC

One of my German Wheat beer Ideas:

Code: Select all

Weisse-ish

Fermentable	Colour	lb: oz	Grams	Ratio
Wheat Malt	3.5 EBC	7 lbs. 6.9 oz	3370 grams	60%
Lager Malt	2.5 EBC	3 lbs. 1.5 oz	1400 grams	25%
Munich Malt	20 EBC	1 lbs. 3.8 oz	560 grams	10%
Caramalt	20 EBC	0 lbs. 9.8 oz	280 grams	5%

Hop Variety	Type	Alpha	Time	lb: oz	grams	Ratio
Willamette	Whole	4.4 %	60 mins	0 lbs. 1.1 oz	31 grams	100%

Final Volume:	23	Litres
Original Gravity:	1.055	
Final Gravity:	1.013	
Alcohol Content:	5.5%	ABV
Total Liquor:	35.1	Litres
Mash Liquor:	14	Litres
Mash Efficiency:	75	%
Bitterness:	13	EBU
Colour:	10	EBC

And another...

Code: Select all

Hopfen Hefe

Fermentable	Colour	lb: oz	Grams	Ratio
Golden Promise	5 EBC	5 lbs. 8.8 oz	2520 grams	49.5%
Wheat Malt	3.5 EBC	5 lbs. 8.8 oz	2520 grams	49.5%
Chocolate Wheat Malt	820 EBC	0 lbs. 1.8 oz	50 grams	1%

Hop Variety	Type	Alpha	Time	lb: oz	grams	Ratio
Nelson Sauvin	Whole	11.3 %	60 mins	0 lbs. 1.1 oz	30 grams	42.9%
Hallertauer Hersbrucker	Whole	2.9 %	15 mins	0 lbs. 0.7 oz	20 grams	28.6%
Hallertauer Hersbrucker	Whole	2.9 %	0 mins	0 lbs. 0.7 oz	20 grams	28.6%

Final Volume:	23	Litres
Original Gravity:	1.050	
Final Gravity:	1.012	
Alcohol Content:	5%	ABV
Total Liquor:	33.4	Litres
Mash Liquor:	12.7	Litres
Mash Efficiency:	75	%
Bitterness:	36.9014748832721	EBU
Colour:	20	EBC

I quite like the idea of the Nelson Sauvin bitterness to come through, though it might work better in a Wit rather than a Weisse.

[dave-o]

I would:

Use as much flaked wheat as you have (if you want that light, thick hoegaarden style)
Use malted wheat to make it up to 50% of the bill
5-10% oats
The rest lager

[Barley Water]

I guess I ain't the sharpest stick in the shead but sometimes you guys confuse me when talking about wheat beer. I don't see Wit beer and Heffeweizen as the same styles at all. Although they are both wheat beers, heffe has a very dominant bananna/clove flavor and aroma while a Wit will tend to have a more "orangy" citrus aspect, bananna/clove would be a flaw in this style (and it's spiced while heffes are never spiced). By the way, I would not put oats in a heffe but I think it's a great idea for a Wit. I would also consider messing with some unmalted wheat in a Wit (it's somewhat traditional). I would be be very careful with the hops in either style although I think the Wit could stand a bit more than a heffe. As far as darkening, with a Wit, you want a pretty pale, cloudy looking beer (think Wit=white). When I make heffe, I try for something maybe a little short of copper color. What I do is add some Munich malt to the grist. Not only will you darken up the beer a little but you also get more bready, melonodian type flavors which I think are great in a heffe. Finally (and I know you have seen me write this before) if you want to win contests around here with a heffe, you almost certainly must do a decoction. It tends to darken the beer a little, develops more melonodian products and most importantly, seems to develop that great German mouthfeel (rant off).

Ok, one more tip for making good Wits, consider adding one tablespoonful of flour (that's right, plain ordinary all purpose flour) to the boil assuming a 5 gallon batch. Since the starches in the flour have not been mashed (and you denatured the enzymes for doing so in the boil) the starch will make it through to the glass. This will give you a pretty permenant white haze which is exactly what you want in the beer. I don't know how many Wits I have judged in competitions which were "lager clear" and again, that's a fault in this style. Remember, Wits were made by farmers and the beer was produced and consumed pretty quickly using pretty primitive methods, really a pretty crude product which adds to it's charm.

Hopefully you will find all this at least somewhat useful, take it for what it is worth. Never forget though, just make what you think will taste good to you, the hell with the style guidelines, this is Belgian beer, just have fun.

[lancsSteve]

Torrefied and malted are both good, I made my wit with a little corainder and orange peel (Randy Mosher recommends malmalade instead).

I'd go 50% at least on the wheat - a mix of flaked and torreifed with remainder made up of malted will get you nearest trad wit. The raw oats will give it the cloudy appearance and flour in mash or boil is also good as BW says.

Personally I see wit and weissen as being VERY similar - almost identical grain bills and hopping schedules + appearance - the difference REALLY highlights the influence of yeast... and just how weird Belgian yeasts are (Example - my mate 'the mumblers' just made a saison, during the recent heat... with a brew belt on ALL the time - at least 30c temps, fermernted down to 1004 and tastes spot on Saison but fermenting over 30c is just lunacy for beer!

Trad wits are traditionally drunk young but can also get a little lactic sourness over time from using weird belgian yeasts (I recultured mine from a bottle of belegems wit) and the unfermented grains - this can be nice and tart and refreshing or nasty depending how far and wild it goes and your view on sourness in beer.

Decoction mashes are fun but unnecessarily complex, stepped infusion + a little melanoidin malt gets you there.

Steve

PS. PDTNC - how was your hemp bitter and how did you make it/bitter it?

[coatesg]

If you use a massive amount of flaked wheat, I would use a good dose of oat hulls to avoid a stuck sparge too! Plus, Chamomile flowers I've seen recommended too in a Wit. (Use the 100% chamomile teabags as a source for the flowers).

[WishboneBrewery]

Cheers for all the replies guys

Steve, the Hemp bitter is very hempy, I think it would be better to have some ground or cracked hemp seed in the Mash rather than the Boil...
The amount of Oils that come out of the ground seed have left a Murky beer with no head retention. Taste-wise its different, would have been a cracking pint without the hemp

[leedsbrew]

The one and only Wit I've made has turned out rather cracking! Recipe is

Code: Select all

Lothlórien Mist

Fermentables
Ingredient Amount % MCU When
UK Lager Malt 2.811 kg 50.0 % 1.8 In Mash/Steeped
UK Wheat Malt 2.249 kg 40.0 % 1.4 In Mash/Steeped
UK Flaked Wheat 0.281 kg 5.0 % 0.1 In Mash/Steeped
German Caramel Pils 0.281 kg 5.0 % 0.2 In Mash/Steeped

Hops
Variety Alpha Amount IBU Form When
US Willamette 4.5 % 25 g 11.1 Loose Whole Hops All Of Boil
US Willamette 4.5 % 12 g 2.5 Loose Whole Hops 15 Min From End

Other Ingredients
Ingredient Amount When
Orange Peel, Sweet 45 g In Boil
Coriander Seed 15 g In Boil

Yeast
DCL WB-06 Safbrew

Even though the total wheat % is only 45% it has turned out very nice. The orange peel hasn't really given it a massive orange flavour. As BW said earlier I think it has added to the bitterness, and given it a bit more of a floral,citrus note. The Willamette has worked very well in this beer. In all I wont be changing anything next time other than use a liquid yeast for comparison.

I'll pop a bottle into the carrier for the swap. I can do next Tuesday if thats good for you matey?

[WishboneBrewery]

Sounds good

[symptomlesscoma]

I think using some oats would be a great idea.

The oats would really add something to both the mouthfeel and the cloudiness, so maybe for my next one I will go 45% lager malt, 45% wheat malt, 5% oats, 5% Munich.

Is that just flaked oats or would malted oats work the same? Can only seem to find malted oats for sale.

[dave-o]

Is that just flaked oats or would malted oats work the same? Can only seem to find malted oats for sale.

Have you looked in the supermarket cereal section? Does 50p a kilo sound any good?