Any thoughts on this Belgian wheat recipe?

So, my good friends and my wife and I are going on a a camping trip in early summer, and I am looking at brewing this recipe for the trip. I am not a huge belgian fan, but my wife and friends love it. I really like Breckenridge agave wheat, and thought if I could do something similar with an orangey citrus flavor that could be perfect. Through looking at different recipes, this is what I've come up with. I am new to this, but think this may work, and could be pretty good. Any thoughts, and ideas on how long I should boil all the different ingredients for?

0.5 lb Crystal 20L crushed grain- steep for 20 minutes or 170 degrees
0.5 lb. Crushed red wheat- steep for 20 minutes or 170 degrees
0.5 lb. Crushed white wheat- Steep for 20 minutes or 170 degrees
3 lbs. extra light Dry Malt Extract- (60 minutes)
3 lbs. Liquid Wheat Malt Extract- (60 minutes)
0.5 lb. Crushed white wheat- 20 minutes or 170 degrees
½ oz bitter orange peel- added to boil at 20 minutes
½ oz sweet orange peel- added to boil at 20 minutes
½ oz. crushed coriander- added to boil at 20 minutes
1.5 oz. Mt Hood hops- 1 oz at 60 minutes, ½ oz. at 5 minutes
1 lb. Agave nectar- added to wort when removed from heat. stirred in while cooling.
Wyeast belgian wheat yeast 3942

I personally add my coriander and orange peel much later (between 5 and 0 minutes)

So, by adding it later in the boil what does this do to the flavor of the orange and coriander? Does it make it less subtle, or more so?

BTW, the second time the white wheat is in there is a typo.

It gives it more flavor and aroma. After about 5 min flavor starts to boil off. Not to say that there will be no flavor at all, but less aroma and more blended flavor.

I also let the wort sit off the heat for q few minutes before chilling and pitching (usually about the ammount of time it takes to set up my fermentor or whatever).

Thanks for the heads up on that, I will definitely keep that in mind. Any other thoughts or opinions on ingredients and boil times from anyone?

What is the 1.5 lbs of wheat supposed to do? It needs to be mashed to contribute sugars. All it will add here is starch making the beer cloudy.

Sounds like a waste of agave nectar. I'd save some of it for bottling (7 ozs should be roughly equivalent to 5 ozs of sugar), and the rest I would add after main fermentation is over.

That's a good question I guess about the grains. Every extract recipe I have done so far has had malt extract plus grains that are steeped prior to the boil, is there no purpose to this? I always assumed it added sugars or flavors or something to the wort...am i wrong with this assumption?

OK, so I did research, and see that wheat needs to be mashed, and I don't have any fancy equipment. Is there an easy way to mash with the pot and the extract equipment I have? What other grains would anyone suggest to steep in place of the wheat? I am thinking maybe honey malt, 1/2 lb, or 3/4 lb. of it, to make it a honey wheat and leave out the agave nectar. Anyone have any thoughts?

brewer8700 said:

That's a good question I guess about the grains. Every extract recipe I have done so far has had malt extract plus grains that are steeped prior to the boil, is there no purpose to this? I always assumed it added sugars or flavors or something to the wort...am i wrong with this assumption?

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There are three types of grains

1) Unmalted - these have to be mashed with malted grains in order to convert startch to sugar.

2) Malted - They can be mashed by themselves to convert the starches to sugars. There may be a few rare instances where certain malted grains do not have enough diastatic power (enough enzymes) to convert all their starch to sugar. In this case, they will have to be mashed with other malted grains, but this is rarely the case.

3) Specialty - These are grains that have already been gelatinized, basically, their starches have been converted to sugars already. Steeping these grains to rinse their sugars is all that needs to be done.

Diastatic power simply refers to the malts ability to convert starch to sugar (enzyme power). This diastatic power is measured in degrees Lintner. A mash needs 30 degrees Lintner per pound of grain to convert starches to sugars although 40-50 would be better. Brewers don't typically have a problem of being short on diastatic power, this is more a problem for those making "beer" mash for distilling purposes. Wheat malt typically has diastatic power of 120, so mashing 1 pound of wheat malt with 2 pounds of wheat would give you 40 degrees Lintner per pound and would make a suitable mash. Using dry or liquid malt extract will NOT convert unmalted wheat starch into sugars, you need malted grain. Using unmalted wheat the way you've described above will contribute starch haze and maybe flavor, but not any fermentable sugars.

Hey, thanks for the help, that helps make some sense out of it, though still trying to wrap my head around it. So steeping them is probably a waste of my time? What is a malted wheat that I would have to mash this with? Is a crystal grain malted? I am completely new to this, so sorry I sound all clueless. So with having no equipment to mash with, what would be a good grain to steep in its place in this style beer?

brewer8700 said:

OK, so I did research, and see that wheat needs to be mashed, and I don't have any fancy equipment. Is there an easy way to mash with the pot and the extract equipment I have? What other grains would anyone suggest to steep in place of the wheat? I am thinking maybe honey malt, 1/2 lb, or 3/4 lb. of it, to make it a honey wheat and leave out the agave nectar. Anyone have any thoughts?

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I don't know what equipment you have, but you could do this. Replace one third of your wheat with malted wheat. Heat 1.25 - 2 quarts of water per pound of grain to be mashed. Use a strike water calculator (try google, there is plenty) to calculate what temperature you need to heat your water up to prior to mashing. You can mash at a wider range of temperatures but 148 - 158 is most common. Lower temperatures will give you a more fermentable sugars and will result in a drier beer with more ABV. Higher temperatures will give more unfermentable sugars and result in a sweeter, less ABV beer. Since your grains make up a small portion of your recipe, it won't matter much. 150 -154 is the most common range for mashing. Once your water has reached temperature, toss in your grains and stir to mix them up evenly. I suggest heating a degree or two above your strike water temperature, then remove from burner. Pull the lid from your pot and stir. When the right temperature is reached, toss in grain. Check temperature. Have some near boiling water and cool water handy to adjust temperature if necessary, although the stike water calculators are very good in my experience. Then place lid on pot. There are a couple options from this point. You can wrap your pot in a sleeping bag or anything else you can think of to insulate. Another option is to turn your oven on and set it to 150. My oven only goes to 170. I preheat to 170, kill the oven, toss in my pot. Then I check in half an hour. I usually turn the oven on for a couple minutes at this point but I kill it before the preheat is even done. Let sit in oven for another 30-60 minutes and your done.

Try to strain the water with as little turbulence as possible. Research hot side oxidation for explaination. Have another pot with 170-175 degree water. Dump this on your grain after straining the original wort. Let that soak for a bit, strain and add to your original wort (research sparging) and your done mashing. Add any more water you desire, bring to boil, and add malt extract and/or hops as desired.

Hope this helps.

brewer8700 said:

Hey, thanks for the help, that helps make some sense out of it, though still trying to wrap my head around it. So steeping them is probably a waste of my time? What is a malted wheat that I would have to mash this with? Is a crystal grain malted? I am completely new to this, so sorry I sound all clueless. So with having no equipment to mash with, what would be a good grain to steep in its place in this style beer?

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Since you only have a small amount of wheat, a chili pot or stew pot will probably be big enough for you to mash with. Crystal falls into the catagory of specialty grains so steeping that is not a waste of time, that is exactly what you should do with that grain. You can get wheat malt extract and simply use that as a portion of your recipe. I've used wheat malt twice and was tickled to death with the results. Most wheat malt is typically 2/3 wheat and 1/3 barley so wheat malt is kind of misleading, however, very few beers use more than 2/3 wheat so this is actually a good thing for us extract/partial mash brewers.

OK, thanks for the help. The one question I still have is if I were to do this partial mash, what is the malted wheat that I would need to buy? How do I know if its malted or unmalted?

This is the wheat I was thinking of buying, is this malted or unmalted? http://www.austinhomebrew.com/product_info.php?cPath=178_21_71_112&products_id=112

And, if I were to buy wheat malt instead of regular wheat, can it just be steeped, or does it need to be mashed too.

It's malted. If it's unmalted it will say specifically. I use the wiki chart here https://www.homebrewtalk.com/wiki/index.php/Malts_Chart it's very helpful.

brewer8700 said:

And, if I were to buy wheat malt instead of regular wheat, can it just be steeped, or does it need to be mashed too.

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It needs to be mashed and the regular wheat, if any, has to be mashed with it.

Mashing is steeping basically, but with a specific set of requirements.

You guys have all been a great help, thanks. I think I will try and mash the wheat, and if for some reason I don't get it right, I will just leave it out, and I think the beer will turn out allright, just with a little less flavor and body.

You can get malted wheat, but I think you will be less confused if you get about 1.5 lbs of 2-row, or Pale malt. That should be sufficient to mash the 1.5 lbs of wheat you have.

Go to the hardware store and get a 5 gallon paint straining bag.

If you start with 3 lbs of (crushed) grains, you will need about 4 quarts of water.

Heat the water to 160 - 164 F. Remove from heat and place straining bag in pot such that it lines the pot. Pour the grains into the bag in the pot. Stir the grains. Place the lid on and leave it for 30 minutes. I stir occasionally. I don't know if it makes much difference.

You want to keep the temperature somewhere between 148 and 156 F. the lower the temp, the more fermentable the wort. When using extract, I would recommend being towards the lower end of the temp range. Starting with a gallon of water, the temp should be OK without any additional heat input for the 30 minutes.

After the 30 minutes is complete people recommend heating the water to 170 F and then removing the bag with the grains and leaving it to drain ... then adding the drained wort. When you use direct heat to the pot like that you can scorch the bag. I use a second pot with the same amount of water in it. I heat the water to about 170 - 175 F. I remove the grain bag from the first pot. Let it drain a little, then place it in the second pot. Stir the grains, and leave it for an additional 10 mminutes. Then remove it and let it drain.

3 lbs of grain like this will get you a similar amount of sugars as almost 2.5 lbs of LME or 2 lbs of DME.

To add to previous information. You don't need to mash crystal, but it does have starches in it, and if you mash it, you will get more out of it.

Calder said:

You can get malted wheat, but I think you will be less confused if you get about 1.5 lbs of 2-row, or Pale malt. That should be sufficient to mash the 1.5 lbs of wheat you have.

Go to the hardware store and get a 5 gallon paint straining bag.

If you start with 3 lbs of (crushed) grains, you will need about 4 quarts of water.

Heat the water to 160 - 164 F. Remove from heat and place straining bag in pot such that it lines the pot. Pour the grains into the bag in the pot. Stir the grains. Place the lid on and leave it for 30 minutes. I stir occasionally. I don't know if it makes much difference.

You want to keep the temperature somewhere between 148 and 156 F. the lower the temp, the more fermentable the wort. When using extract, I would recommend being towards the lower end of the temp range. Starting with a gallon of water, the temp should be OK without any additional heat input for the 30 minutes.

After the 30 minutes is complete people recommend heating the water to 170 F and then removing the bag with the grains and leaving it to drain ... then adding the drained wort. When you use direct heat to the pot like that you can scorch the bag. I use a second pot with the same amount of water in it. I heat the water to about 170 - 175 F. I remove the grain bag from the first pot. Let it drain a little, then place it in the second pot. Stir the grains, and leave it for an additional 10 mminutes. Then remove it and let it drain.

3 lbs of grain like this will get you a similar amount of sugars as almost 2.5 lbs of LME or 2 lbs of DME.

To add to previous information. You don't need to mash crystal, but it does have starches in it, and if you mash it, you will get more out of it.

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How is malted barley less confusing than malted wheat? Malted wheat typically has higher diastatic power than barley, which would be good for a beginning masher.

Knew2Brew said:

How is malted barley less confusing than malted wheat? Malted wheat typically has higher diastatic power than barley, which would be good for a beginning masher.

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I've brewed for 15 years. I know 2-row, 6-row, Pale Malt, and a number of other base malts will add the diastatic power to mash other grains. I've never actually mashed with malted wheat. Before you putting it in the post, I didn't realize there was a difference between the wheats. To me, looking for Malted wheat versus other wheat would be confusing. I assume my LHBS stocks it, but I have never seen it.

Calder said:

I've brewed for 15 years. I know 2-row, 6-row, Pale Malt, and a number of other base malts will add the diastatic power to mash other grains. I've never actually mashed with malted wheat. Before you putting it in the post, I didn't realize there was a difference between the wheats. To me, looking for Malted wheat versus other wheat would be confusing. I assume my LHBS stocks it, but I have never seen it.

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Just be happy you have a LHBS. My "local" store is an hour and a half so I use Northern Brewer a lot. Online retailers have been good thus far about noting what is not malted and what is.....often times the malted and unmalted grains being listed on different pages all together.