My take on Randy Mosher's Tangerine Porter

I've been thinking about brewing this one for a while now and finally got around to it! Mine is slightly different. Slightly higher gravity, more spices, more hops and zest. This should be hitting its peak around the holidays so I kind of took it in that direction. Tangerines are not available this time of the year, so I went with clementine zest. If its lacking citrus character, I plan on adding some tangerine zest extracted with vodka at bottling time. Anyway, here is what I did!

For 5.5 Gallons, Partial Mash Recipe:

3 lbs Wheat DME
3 lbs Amber DME
1 lb American 6-row
1 lb Caramunich III
1 lb Flaked Wheat
1 lb Flaked Oats
.5 lb Special B
.5 lb Midnight Wheat

Hops, Spices, Aromatics:
60M .5 oz Willamette
10M 1 oz Willamette + Spices (see below)
5M .5 oz UK EKG (leaf)
0M .5 oz Willamette, .5 oz UK EKG, 1/8 cup clementine zest

Spices:
.25 oz dried orange blossoms
1 tblsp star anise (lightly crushed)
1 tblsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground cardamom

Yeast: Wyeast Belgian Wit 3944; pitched at 63F

OG: 1.072

Smelled totally amazing on the stove. Stoked to see how this comes out!!!

Update: Got this one bottled up and cracked one the other day (only about a week old so far). Bleh! Extremely disappointing. Something is...off- not quite sure what it is yet- diacetyl? A hint of spices and then it just tastes flat/buttery/weird. Zero citrus character (and considering I put the zest of a whole bags' worth of clementines in it, a bit strange!). Also added some citrus extract I made from additional tangerine zest and rum at bottling. So, to conclude, not sure if it is phenolics from the yeast, diacetyl or something else, but its almost in the 'dump' category at the moment. Could just be way to green at this point! Hopefully it improves in time.

If it's just a week after bottling, it may be extremely yeasty. I say give them two more weeks in the bottles, and then toss one in the fridge for a few days at least to make sure you're not getting too much yeast in your beer.

That is a good point, I'm probably just tasting straight up yeast! 3944 is a poor flocculator too, so I bet that is what is going on. No bother, I will let these age a peace and then try again. Cheers!