Brewing a Wit Tonight, suggestions? Options

[evanevfs]

I've seen a couple other threads about wits lately, and I based my recipe roughly off of those. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

3# 6-row
3# wheat malt
2.5# LME (late addition)
0.75 oz Sterling (7.8%) at 60 min
0.5 oz ground coriander at 5 min
1.0 oz fresh orange peel at 5 min
WY3944

I've also read about adding a tablespoon of flour into the boil to give some hazyness, though it seems that not using irish moss would cause enough chill haze to make it unnecessary.

[csbosox]

If you have it, I would swap out the wheat malt for flaked wheat. Is your LME wheat LME?

[evanevfs]

If you have it, I would swap out the wheat malt for flaked wheat. Is your LME wheat LME?

I don't have flaked wheat, just malt. What's the difference? I kind of just thought that one was self-converting and one wasnt. Also, when I got back from the LHBS, I realized that I should have gotten a larger proportion of wheat for my mini-mash as my LME is just barley. oops. Hopefully it'll still taste good.

[csbosox]

I'm sure it will taste good, but it won't really taste like a wit since there is not enough wheat in the recipe. Flaked wheat's flavor is closer to raw wheat than malted wheat, but you don't have to cereal mash it, making it an easier alternative for wits. In the future, you might add flaked oats to your wit as well.

[hubcap750]

Skip the flour, add a pound of oatmeal instead. I also toss in about 1/8 of a teaspoon of cumin at 5 mins. Radical Brewing says no way to the cumin, but Michael Jackson said it was the secret ingredient. Michael Jackson is definately right on this one. Are you using orange peel or orange zest? I'd go with zest myself.

[hophead]

I also toss in about 1/8 of a teaspoon of cumin at 5 mins.

I agree with this although I never tell my friends it's in the beer...

[BushDoctor]

A pound of oats will give a nice creamy texture. I like the fresh orange peel. I made a wit last year with 1 oz. of fresh orange peel. It had a nice citrus flavor without overpowering.

[evanevfs]

Skip the flour, add a pound of oatmeal instead. I also toss in about 1/8 of a teaspoon of cumin at 5 mins. Radical Brewing says no way to the cumin, but Michael Jackson said it was the secret ingredient. Michael Jackson is definately right on this one. Are you using orange peel or orange zest? I'd go with zest myself.

well, unfortunately it's too late for this batch, it's now fermenting away, but summer is coming up and that means wits to me, so maybe i'll throw another batch onto the yeast cake in a week or so. thanks for the suggestions!

[evanevfs]

Flaked wheat's flavor is closer to raw wheat than malted wheat, but you don't have to cereal mash it, making it an easier alternative for wits. In the future, you might add flaked oats to your wit as well.

Flaked wheat doesnt need to be mashed? Please explain.

[BrewerGeorge]

... Flaked wheat's flavor is closer to raw wheat than malted wheat, but you don't have to cereal mash it, making it an easier alternative for wits. In the future, you might add flaked oats to your wit as well.

Flaked wheat doesnt need to be mashed? Please explain.

Flaked wheat does have to be mashed to convert, but it does not need a cereal mash. A cereal mash in a somewhat-involved procedure of boiling the unmalted grains for a long time and adding them to the mash for conversion. Boiling it gelates the starches and makes them accessible to the enzymes for conversion. Flaked products are nice because they are gelated in production and can just be tossed into a normal single-infusion mash and they will convert. (All flaked grains DO need something malted in the mash to convert them, though. They won't convert themselves.)

[evanevfs]

Gotcha. So, (and please excuse my ignorance) is wheat malt self-converting then? I guess that makes sense since the point of malting is to let the grains germinate to cause amylase expression.
While I'm on this train of thought, I've been confused for quite a while about the role of crystal malt. I thought that it was just malt that was heated enough to denature the enzymes so that it cant self convert, but somehow it raises the fg even when it's mashed. What's going on here? How are those starches not convertable and/or sugars not fermentable?

[beerpilot]

Normally you would use 1/2 ounce of 3-4.0 AA SAAZ hops. 7.8 Sterling...damn...you are brewing a wit not an IPA. It will definitely be overly hoppy for this type of beer. Try using less hops, and a lower aa so the flavor of the beer can come through. I too use a pound of flaked wheat in the all grain mix for that nice creamy head.

[evanevfs]

I just racked this one to a keg for a quick secondary and carbonating. On the way, I filled a glass, and I have to say, this is by far the best beer I've made. It's a beautiful cloudy light straw color (a little dark for style, but such is life in the extract world), and has a great coriander nose and flavor. Next time I may back off the coriander a bit (maybe .3oz) and increase the orange peel, but overall, I'm really happy with this beer! I cant wait to get it cooled and carbed.

This post has been edited by evanevfs: Apr 7 2008, 11:54 PM