Brett finished Motueka Biere de Mars

Inspired by an old bottle of Ommegang Biere de Mars I found and all the amazing beers from Anchorage, I'm planning a brett finished BdM. Open to recipe critiques and suggestions! This is for a 6 gallon batch, 75% efficiency.

Heritage (Munich) Malt 6 lbs
Pale Malt 2 lbs
Red Wheat Malt 4 lbs
Toasted Oat Malt 1 lb
Toasted Rolled Oats 8 oz
CaraVienne 8 oz
CaraMunich II 4 oz
Spec B 2 oz
DeHusk Carafa II 2 oz

Mash at 156 for 60 min, 90 min boil. Shooting for 1.056.

1 oz Motueka @ 60, 30, 15, & 0 - 45ish IBU.

Ferment with WLP072 at 64, ramping to 70 as fermentation slows.

Rack to secondary add Wyeast Brett Brux and age 6 months before bottling.

Hopefully the malt will be enough to stand up to the Motueka and the brett. What I'm waffling on is doing a spice addition in the kettle. Not usually my style, but Anchorage does such a great job with subtle spicing to round out a beers flavor. I'm considering someting along the lines of 1g allspice, 1 or 2 cloves, (maybe tiny amount of star anise) & 3.5g fresh orange peel. Hopefully the orange will compliment the motueka and the subtle spicing will marry the citrus and funk behind the malt shining through.

I can almost taste the beer thinking about it and so far I've been happy with beers I've had that feeling about. I'm a little uncertain since I've never drank a Motueka beer so I'm only going off what I've heard Motueka tastes like.

I like Motueka, although I have never tried it in a brett. I have used it in saisons, usually with citra as well. I find it works very well if you are trying for a fruity saison.

Hmm, now you've given me some ideas for another saison with brett-c recipe, with Motueka and citra...

After gathering some additional advice I've changed a few things. Went with Pilsner malt instead of Pale, dropped the oats and oat malt to 1/4 lb ea, dropped CaraVienne and Special B, and upped CaraMunich to 1/2 lb. Going to skip the spices on this batch to see if they would blend. If this beer tastes as good as I think it will, I might skip the brett on this batch and get some more motueka to brew 10 gallons instead of 5.

TNGabe said:

After gathering some additional advice I've changed a few things. Went with Pilsner malt instead of Pale, dropped the oats and oat malt to 1/4 lb ea, dropped CaraVienne and Special B, and upped CaraMunich to 1/2 lb. Going to skip the spices on this batch to see if they would blend. If this beer tastes as good as I think it will, I might skip the brett on this batch and get some more motueka to brew 10 gallons instead of 5.

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Someone gave you some good advice in my opinion.

Calder said:

Someone gave you some good advice in my opinion.

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Constructive. Thanks!

9 malts, crazyness. Looks tasty.

bovineblitz said:

9 malts, crazyness. Looks tasty.

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I ended up going with 7 - dropped the caravienne and special B. Came out pretty much exactly like I planned, although even with the high mash temp and fermenting in the low 60s it's still down to 1.010 without the brett. I'm either going add brett and bottle when it drops to 1.005, or just prime it and not do the brett. Have some more Motueka in the mail and will rebrew it with the spices and special B later this week.