2006-06-17 Winkel Wit, inpsired by Sean White's recipe 1.048 OG, 22 IBU, 4.8% ABV 5.5 lb Pils 3 lb Malted Wheat 3 lb Flaked Wheat 4.75 oz oats (I would have used 8 oz, but I only had this much) 1/2 lb Rice Hulls .5 oz Perle 7% for 60 mins .5 oz Hallertauer 3.2% for 30 mins .5 oz corriander for 15 mins .5 oz dried bitter orange peel for 15 mins 1 tsp irish moss for 15 mins Wyeast 3944: Belgian Wit NOTE: this is the first brew with the 13.75 gallon pot. 1 gallon of water at room temp equals 1.125 inches, so 8 gals (runoff) is 9 inches. Mash ---- - put all grains, including flaked wheat and oats, through grain mill - NOTE: in future, when measuring grains, put base malt in bucket first, so that when grind, then pour from ground bucket to mash tun, so that base malt (with husks) is at the bottom. - mash in with 3.75 gals of 165F water -> 147F mash - saccharification rest for 50 mins - then add 1 gal boiling water to raise temp to 159, and let rest 10 mins - runoff enough to collect 8 gals, sparging with an additional 5 gals, so lost 1.75 gals in the grain after mash...This seems a little high... Boil ---- - boil 60 mins, adding hops as specified Whirlpool/Transfer ------------------ - hop cone held together much better with this brew, as the bigger diameter - of the pot let the hops/break actually cone up. - measured .8 gallons of hops/break/liquid left in brew pot after transfer to carboy, thus, we calculate 1.2 gallons evaporation, for 20%. Ferment ------- - Ferment in my room at 68F, but away from the directly cold air from the AC - pitched a very vigorous starter, and was bubbling a bit after 2 hours, high Krausen after 10 hours. 2006-06-24 Rack --------------- - Racked after only 1 week in primary, because needed the carboy for Old Dirty. Lost less than a half gallon of yeasty sludge. - SG was 1.030, yeast never got that good and happy, so I may need to rack it again before I keg it. Crap. - can really taste the corriander, and there's a bit of sourness already, not sure why, maybe from the flaked wheat? Can maybe taste a little bit of bitterness, maybe hops, maybe bitter orange peel. 2006-07-05 Get ready to keg --------------------------- - Set on kitchen counter on the 5th after work - Started fermenting again, as I roused the yeast by moving it, and the kitchen is 10 degrees warmer than the 70F bedroom - I'll give it another couple days until I keg it (given how high the gravity was at racking) 2006-07-09 Keg -------------- - still bubbling at 12 secs/bubble - keg and bottle 6 bottles w/2 carbonation drops - FG 1.018, a bit high, and may still ferment out a bit in kegs 2006-07-11 Taste ---------------- - filled a 22oz bottle from the keg/kegerator, and took it to Mary's beer/food pairings class. - got comments ranging from musty to phenolic to "band aid", etc. and Sean thought that there was wild yeast in it, which could mean anything from wild yeast on up through the worst bacteria. - CRAP!!!! On second thought, I mistook the "mustiness" for excessive corriander and bitter orange flavor. I thought at first that it might have been the bottle (as I just rinsed out an empty, filled it, and capped it for transport), but I tasted directly from the keg again, and it had the same phenolic flavor. I'm not sure what to suspect except poor fucking sanitation. Damn it! I thought I was past this point!