Belgian Honey Wheat

Good Afternoon, I am looking to put together a recipe for a nice christmas belgian honey wheat beer.

I am newer to the beer making process but i want to try to do a all grain batch. i have a 6 gallon carboy so i guess my max batch size is around 5 gallons.

What must i have to start this recipe?

Michael

BakerBeer said:

Good Afternoon, I am looking to put together a recipe for a nice christmas belgian honey wheat beer.

I am newer to the beer making process but i want to try to do a all grain batch. i have a 6 gallon carboy so i guess my max batch size is around 5 gallons.

What must i have to start this recipe?

Michael

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Assuming you have all the equipment you need, such as a 5 gallon mash-tun, 8-10 gallon boil kettle and (optionally) a hot liquor tank and method to fly-sparge, you should be able to do this recipe easily.

I'm not sure what you mean by a "Christmas" honey wheat ale, but with this base recipe you could add holiday spices. Maybe 1 cinnamon stick, 1/4 tsp nutmeg and 1 oz of fresh, peeled ginger, all added at flame-out and steeped 10-20 minutes before cooling the wort. I wouldn't add more than that or they'll mask the more delicate flavors in the wheat beer.

Here's my take on it:

Style-------Weissebier/Weizen; Honey
Type-------All-Grain; 5 gallons; 72% efficiency
Water------7.75 gallons
Pre-Boil Gravity---1.037
OG---------1.049
FG---------1.010
SRM--------7.3
IBUs--------11.8
ABV---------5%

Grain Bill

4# Pale Malt, 2-row, Belgian; 44.4%
2# Wheat Malt, Belgian; 22.2%
1# Crystal 20L; 11.1%
0.5# Carapils; 5.6%
0.25# Aromatic Malt; 2.8%
0.25# Caramunich Malt; 2.8%

Mash Method: Single Infusion, Full Body

Mash-In: 10qt water @ 168F (156F ST); 45 minutes
Mash-Out: 5.2qt @ 195F (168F ST); 10 minutes
Fly-Sparge: 3.9 gallons @ 168F over 45 minutes

Sugars/Adjuncts/Fining

1 tsp Irish Moss; 30 minutes
4oz Malto-Dextrin; 10 minutes
1# Honey; Add at flame-out

Hops

.25 oz Strisslespalt (4% AA); 60 min
.25 oz Strisslespalt (4% AA); 45 min
.25 oz Strisslespalt (4% AA); 30 min
.25 oz Strisslespalt (4% AA); 15 min

Yeast

Wyeast Belgian Wheat (3942); 1.25L Starter w/ Stir-Plate (1.75L w/out)

Fermentation/Conditioning

Primary 21 days @ 69F; Bottle w/ 4.25oz Priming Sugar (2.5 vol); Age 30 days

Nice!

I would like to take a few and go over what i have available...

I have the following
24Qt stainless steel pot with false bottom and rack
6.5 gallon carboy with bum plug and 3 peice airlock
temp gauge
long stainless steel stir

I can easily pick up a 10g bucket from lowes or home depot for mashin (unless their not good enough)

anything else you suggest?

If you want to get a bucket for transfers then you should get an NSF one rated for use with food. The ones at Lowes and Home Depot aren't meant for storing hot food like wort as they can leach harmful chemicals and off flavors into the beer.

If you have a 6 gallon mash pot you plan on using for the boil as well, then you'll need to scale the recipe back to 3 gallons as you'll have a 6.75 gallon boil volume. If you have an 8-10 gallon boil kettle you can use in addition to the mash pot then you should be fine.

Without a hot liquor tank and sparge arm or at least a colander, then you'll need to do batch sparging which you can find out how to do on several threads here and in John Palmer's online bookHow to Brew. On this recipe you'll mash-in with 10qt water @ 168F (156F ST) and do three batch sparges of 0.75gal, 2.25gal and 2.25gal water @ 168F each.

Other than that you should be able to do this recipe, though you may want to run all this by the guys at your LHBS for any additional thoughts they may have.

GOOD LUCK!

Thank you! i think i will buy a either a 36+Qt mash pot and use it for the boil. I will give the sarge a look online and maybe some you tube videos

Got me a 42Qt Mash ton from my local brew shop... I think i am going to attempt this week. Got some great pointers from my local brew shop in Winchester VA.

That's great! My local home brew shop guys are always really generous about answering questions and they've taught me quite a bit. It sounds like you're dealing with a great group of people too. Have fun making your first AG batch and remember slow and steady wins the race (i.e. Fast beer tastes like fast food). :cross:

my recipe is made for a 5gallon batch of beer. I had made 5 gallons of mash... didnt hit my temp exactly right.. came in around 148... my mash ton must be crap even with blankets around it.

i am boiling right now but i see i am loosing volume. do i add water?

Boiling off some of the volume is part of AG brews. Your pre-boil gravity will always be lower than what your original gravity is supposed to be due to sparging. Generally, on 5 gallon brews, your pre-boil volume will be anywhere from 6-8 gallons depending on how long you boil and the sparging method you use. You will also lose a bit while cooling the wort. You want to boil down to 5 gallons and add extra, sanitized water if it is below your 5 gallon mark once you reach pitching temp, but usually this will only be 1-2 quarts at most.

It kind of works the opposite to extract brewing where you'll do a 2-3 gallon boil and top off afterwards.

As far as the mash temp is concerned, if you're using a brew kettle mash tun you can always bottom heat it, stir and turn the flame down very low until it just maintains the temperature you're looking for. 148F will give you a lighter body, highly fermentable wort, but it's close enough you shouldn't have an issue as far as fermentation is concerned. It will just be slightly higher in ABV and a bit dryer than what you previously intended.

Its all good, it was my first all grain batch and if nothing i have learned so much this afternoon. I will have tons of questions. I kept a little book of questions i will post soon. I found that my mash ton is junk today. So i need to work on building a better one or maybe move to a kettle mash. maybe use a brew in the bag method.

I started at 164 degrees and my temp dropped to around 145-148...

thanks for the help guys! i will keep at this and before i know it i will be brewing grade A beer.

Most DIYers use 5 or 10 gallon beverage coolers (Igloo, Rubbermaid, etc.). There are plenty of posts on here on how to easily convert them. I use a 5 gallon Igloo cooler and my temps stay stable while mashing. You can get premade false bottoms or make your own pretty cheaply.

If you decide to go that route I would suggest a 10 gallon cooler as my 5 gallon is limited to about 8-9lbs of grain before maxing out, so if I want to do higher gravity beers I need to supplement them with LME/DME or sugars. You can also use the larger square ones for even more capacity, but you'll need to make a manifold which is a bit trickier.

It's a big learning process, but you made a great attempt. Kudos!

Ok well, instead of me posting all my questions at once i figure i will post one at a time.

As in my previous post i mentioned my mash ton is kinda junky. I bought a Igloo 42 Qt rectangle cooler this past summer and attempted to convert it into a nice larger mash ton. I went to my local brew shop and picked up a stainless steel ball valve, a bulkhead and a few rubber gaskets. I then headed out to Lowe's where i picked up some PVC to make what i think you guys call a manifold. My manifold was rectangle and fit in the bottom of the cooler. I drilled holes facing the bottom. I think i might have made the holes slightly to large as it was super easy for the PVC to clog up, which pushed some sugar sized grain into my brew kettle.

After boiling for 60 min i chilled the wart to 70-72 degrees and transferred it into my primary fermentor. I then started to aerate the wart real good and added my yeast. I capped with a bung and air valve filed with a little water to prevent air from getting back into the airlock.

After about 30min-1hour i am seeing a great deal of what i think is the same sugar sized grain at the bottom of my cataboy. I think i am going to let this sit for a few days and transfer into a second dairy fermentor. I will use a syphon to pull out the liquid just above the sediment line. Will there be any problems with this?

If you've already pitched I'd give it a week in the primary before transferring it to secondary or at least wait until after your krausen has settled down. The grain at the bottom of your fermenter won't harm anything and, as you mentioned, it'll be gone when you rack to secondary.

When I'm sparging I run the tubing from my mash tun down into a mesh strainer (like you would get in the kitchen section of a walmart or the like) that I clamp to the top of my brew pot. This usually keeps the pinch or so of grain material that makes it's way past my false bottom from getting in the boil.

Its been a few days... fermentation seems to be moving along quite nicely! I seem lots moving around inside and a nice aroma coming from the airlock. it seems to be bubbling once every 3 sec.

When i transfer over to my secondary should i wait till fermentation is complete? or just before? i only ask because since the yeast is moving things around the bottom keeps stirred up so if i was to transfer over into the secondary i would most likely get some little nasties along with the transfer...

I'd leave it in primary for 1 week and leave it in secondary for 2 weeks. There's the ol' "1-2-3" rule of thumb for ales: 1 week in primary, 2 weeks in secondary and 3 weeks conditioning (bottled or kegged), then you can drink it. There's some debate about whether or not that is necessary, but that's what I've been doing on mine and it hasn't steered me wrong. Anything that gets transferred from the primary (trub, yeast cake, etc.) will flocculate out in the secondary which is just a clearing, spice and dry hopping and a last few points of FG reaching phase.

Everyone has a different way of doing things with brewing, especially with all-grain. Some like a primary and secondary while others insist that just a primary fermentation is all you need. Read all the pros and cons of each you can and find what works best for you. I like doing a primary and secondary because when I've done just a primary the beer has been a little "meatier" than I like, but you may find you like the slight earthiness of only doing a primary.

One thing that helped me with learning was doing simple 1 gallon recipes and testing different methods. It makes for a cheap but educational brew day and if you make a huge mistake you're only out $10 and 7-10 beers that need to be dumped or swallowed quickly.

I'd leave it in primary for 1 week and leave it in secondary for 2 weeks

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So even though i am getting airbubble coming through the airlock i should still transfer into the secondary?

There's the ol' "1-2-3" rule of thumb for ales: 1 week in primary, 2 weeks in secondary and 3 weeks conditioning (bottled or kegged), then you can drink it.

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Sounds plausable

Anything that gets transferred from the primary (trub, yeast cake, etc.) will flocculate out in the secondary which is just a clearing, spice and dry hopping and a last few points of FG reaching phase.

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Dont quite understand

Also, for a wheat beer my beer is very dark! I have a 6+ inch head of foam in my primary and the bottom of the container has a 1inch bed of sugar sized grain. The Yeast is really stirring up everything! its crazy to think it has that ability! pretty cool!

The foam is krausen which forms while the yeast is at the peak of its activity. It will dissipate after the yeast settles down. Generally 1 week is enough for most fermentations to get out of the krausen phase, but sometimes it can take longer, so wait until you're getting 1 bubble a minute or less and the krausen has dissipated. That is usually a good time to transfer.

Secondary fermentation isn't fermentation, per se, but rather used to allow more of the yeast and any large proteins to settle to the bottom before bottling/kegging as a means of making the beer clearer and cleaner. It is also the best time to rack onto fruit, dry hop and add any spices like cinnamon, oak chips, etc. That's why the argument is made by some that the secondary is unnecessary if you aren't doing any of those things.

Ahhh Briliant!

Makes total sence now zzARzz! thanks!

I added orange zest to and honey tomy wart right after flame out. You think i could maybe add a little more orange zest and honey? or would the sugars bring the yeast back into action?

also, will my beer clear up and maybe get lighter? its kinda dark right now.

Michael

You can rack into secondary on top of more orange zest, though when you take a gravity reading you may want to taste it and see if it is necessary. I wouldn't add more honey unless you want to bump up the ABV and make it a bit drier.

As far as the color, did you boil the honey or add it at flame-out when the boil was done? I can only imagine you may have had some caramelization in the wort to make it so dark, but remember that a large 5 gallon batch will appear darker in the fermenter than it will in the bottle. My honey wheat looked like a brown ale in the secondary but now has a pretty dark, golden color after bottling:

Well, this being my first all grain batch i filled my brew pot to 5 gallons before boil... once boil was completed i had just over 4 gallons. (lesson learned was to add one extra gallon before boil) I added the zest and 8oz of honey at flame out. I stired well and chilled to 70ish degrees. Then transfered into my cataboy, airated and added my yeast directly to the wart.

One resource that helped me quite a bit when I started was the All-Grain section of Palmer's How to Brew. It covers different mash methods, ratios of water to grain during mash steps and a lot of other great information. It will give you a much better foundation to build on moving forward.

Very nice guide, i have spent the last few days at work reading over it.

So my first all grain brew is about 2 week old come this friday the 7th of dec. I have started timing the bubbles coming from my airlock. Currently i am getting a single bubble every 48-50 seconds.

I have the brew sitting in a clear cataboy in my man cave so i would have to say the temp of the brew stays around room temp which is around 68-70ish.

I have noticed that the Krouse (sp) is thinning out but still very much on top of the brew. I was told the krouse will eventually settle to the bottom, however it hasn't really show these signs over the past few days.

I also also noticed a slight weird smell coming from the airlock. To dont really stink but its not a smell i would relate to the beer making process. Is this normal? I would assume this is normal since the yeast has pretty much ate up all the sugars so that sweet beer or alc. smell is fading away. Does krouse have a smell? and if so what does it smell like?

Also would it be ok to rack this into my secondary with the krouse still on top and bubbling at 50ish seconds? or should i give it till friday?

Sometime between now and the weekend would be a good time to rack it to the secondary. Your brew is probably at the end of the late krausen stage (aka stationary phase), but it's not unusual for the krausen foam floating at the top not to dissipate. It's better to rack to secondary before you have any issues with autolysis, which is what happens when the yeast die and their cell walls break down, releasing very unpleasant flavors into the beer (described as a burnt rubber smell/taste), though this usually only happens when the yeast is left far too long without nutrients or food (well over a month in primary).

If it's a sharp, yeasty, beer-ish smell coming from the airlock then that is normal. If it is a cooked vegetable/cabbage smell then you may have an issue with dimethyl sulfide (DMS) which is caused by cooling the wort too slowly, boiling with a lid on and/or bacterial infections. If it is a sulfur/rotten egg smell then it is likely an issue with infection. Lager yeasts often produce a sulfur smell while fermenting that dissipates, but in ales it is almost always an infection.

Taste a sample when you transfer it to secondary after taking a gravity reading and if it makes you want to puke it's a good sign you'll need to toss it. If there are some minor, green beer off flavors then that is normal and they will disappear after aging.

Ok, sounds good. Nice post!


The smell is different, I can't really categorize the smell into any one of those that you mentioned. I can say I used a trash can full of ice to cool the wart when I was done boiling. I would say within 15-20 min it was down to 70ish then I aerated and tossed in the yeast stirred and let set.

Question, when I rack to the secondary, and let set for another week or 2... Will this DNS still not happen? Should I maybe put container in a little cooler climate? Say in my basement?

It's probably just the normal smell that comes from fermentation so I wouldn't sweat it. The real test is in the taste and you'll certainly know if something is wrong at that point. Remember, though, you'll taste some off flavors when you transfer it which is completely normal and they'll dissipate as the brew ages.

As long as the temperature in the area which your fermenter resides is stable (the ambient temp doesn't fluctuate more than a degree or two) and around your fermentation temperature, placing the carboy where you had your primary would be fine and likely preferable as the yeast won't need to adjust, thus running the risk of getting stressed.

OK, well i decided to move it into the secondary this morning. i found it odd i only had 3 gallons of beer. This is a 5 gallon recipe... will this hurt the beer? I guess i must have boiled off more then i thought.

I took a hydro and measured my beer @ 1.003

Well, you have beer at any rate. Generally for an all-grain batch your pre-boil volume will be anywhere from 6.5-7.5 gallons and you boil down to 5 from there. The low gravity is likely due to the honey and, because of its low gravity, tends to make for a drier beer (i.e. a lower FG). That would also explain why it is so dark because it's concentrated. You could try watering it down with a gallon or two of boiled, dechlorinated water, but you may be better off just leaving it at 3 gallons which is what I would do. How does it taste?

Actually I just ran your numbers and, assuming you had average to decent efficiency, your OG would be around 1.080, meaning your beer is about 10% alcohol with a 1.003 FG. Watering it down a bit may not be a bad idea.

It taste like beer however it does have those odd flavors you were talking about.

Should I just maybe try again? Or maybe bottle 6 after my secondary? I would like to see how this turns out

This was a fun experience, it was meant as a learning experience and indeed that's what I got. You seem to be a very knowledgeable beer making individual.

What part of the county are you from?

You'll get a case out of 3 gallons so it may be worth just bottling the whole thing; besides it will give you some valuable experience with priming, bottling and conditioning.

The best way to get good at all this is to read, reread, read some more, do it, read again... well, you get my point . It's a complicated science and art, so the more knowledge you gather the better you'll be.

I'm from Kentucky and got into all of this when I did a project for culinary school. I made a ginger beer for a project in International Cooking and had the whole class ****faced (instructor included) during our final. It's easy to get an "A" when the instructor is "feeling good." I found I like home brewing and have been obsessed with it since. I've only been doing it about 6 months, though, so I'm hardly the end all, be all of brewing knowledge; I learn something new everyday.

Like I said, brewing can be complicated but stick with it and you'll make some great beer. Plus it's fun throwing a "BYOHB" (Bring Your Own Home Brew) party. We had some friends over at my girlfriend's place and I made dinner with all the home brew I made. Inside of an hour it turned into a Roman Festival and I think I had somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 empty bottles for just 6 of us. Everyone had a great time.

Brewing software isn't required but it's a nice luxury, especially when learning. A good free recipe calculator is Beer Calculus, but I use BeerSmith which is fantastic once you get past its steep learning curve.

Good books to peruse are How to Brew, like I mentioned previously and if you want a good print one The Brewmaster's Bible by Stephen Snyder has good beginning info but is really valuable for the hundreds of recipes it has in it. It's nice for seeing what ingredient commonalities there are within a particular style.

Another resource I would recommend is the BJCP's Style Guidelines. There you'll see what is generally accepted for a particular style when it comes to competition settings. That's not to say you need to be a slave to their numbers or wishes, but it's good for knowing where the boundaries lie within a particular style.

Finally, Wyeast's Home Page has a lot of good info, particularly concerning yeast, that I reference almost daily. Brew Your Own Magazine also has a ton of articles covering almost every facet of brewing, from beginner to advanced, so you should certainly check them out as well.

Oh, one last thing: I've made plenty of mistakes, so never let them discourage you!

I am about to bottle my first all grain batch. It was suppose to be a five gallon batch but I boiled it down to a little over 3 gallons. To prime this with dextrose I am reading one OZ per gallon.... True?

So I am starting to prep all my bottles and using all clean on my bottling bucket,16oz bottles and equipment. I have everything ready and waiting to bottle till tonight. So, Curiously got to me to smell my wort.... I gently removed the airlock from the top and took a quick smell.... I about fell on my ass... Lmfo. It smells like pure grain alcohol. Has a wonderful beer like smell! However I think this might just be at the 10+% alcohol.

Should I maybe boil me a gallon of spring water and maybe mix it in really well?

You could do that or boil a gallon of spring water for 10 minutes, cut the heat and stir in your priming sugar. Chill it and put it in your bottling bucket before siphoning in the beer. Be sure to gently (you don't want to introduce air into it) but thoroughly mix it, though. You may also want to add some additional priming sugar (about 3 oz total should make it around 2.5 volumes).

Ok, I used a little less then a half cup of dextrose. I did some re search online as to the ratio of gallons of wart to priming sugar and I found that a one to one ratio seems to work.

After bottling the color looks great, and the smell also has a nice beer aroma.

I think I am going to buy the ingredients again after the holidays and try again...

That's great you're going to try again. Just remember that with all grain your pre-boil volume (at least with this recipe) should be about 6.5 gallons. After an hour boil and cooling it will reduce to about 5 gallons at pitching, giving you a yield of 4.5 gallons at bottling (2 cases of 12oz bottles).

Absolutely! Thanks for all your help! You have been such a great asset throughout this process! Happy holidays to you and your family.

I like to help people, so no problem. Happy holidays to you and yours as well.

OK, so i decided to make this batch again!

Same Ingredients minus the honey, and instead of orange zest, i have pealed 3 large oranges and going to toss the skins in @ 30 min

My first question pertains to OG... Is OG your Preboil volume or before the first mash out?

Second Question... My last batch of this seems like it was much sweeter when i was draining from the mash tun... should i be concerned?

I know i hit my temperature numbers right on the nose! i check the temp in the mash tun every 30 min. never dropped below 152. I went out and got a new Igloo 5 gallon cooler and a mighty nice strainer that screws into my ball valve. I had very little grain pass through I am getting better at this!

I also added some PH right (5.2) to the pre mash so i feel my PH should have been good all throughout. (when i say pre-mash, i mean while i was mixing the hot water and grain together)

My pre boil volume is around 6.5 gallons and as i am typing this boiling down to 5.5 gallons... i may end up boiling down to 5 gallons.

Suggestions?

Practice gets you to Carnegie Hall.

Original Gravity is measured post-boil (right before you pitch). Pre-boil Gravity is measured after you have sparged and you're ready to begin the boil. For instance, on a honey wheat ale I did, my Pre-boil Gravity was 1.039 SG (6.25 gallons of collected wort) but my OG was 1.051 SG after the boil (5 gallons when I pitched). OG will be higher than PBG due to the sugar being concentrated because of water loss during the boil.

I've used pH 52 in several of my brews, especially if I have a large percentage of dark specialty grains (they tend to lower the pH of the wort by a large degree) and, having measured the pH, it really does work, at least for me. I've heard of people having mixed results with it and others with a subjective experience that it alters the flavor of their beer. I've not noticed a difference in mine having used it versus not and perhaps it works for the water chemistry of my area better than that of others, so really it is a matter of a trial and error for you to experiment with and see if you like it or not.

There are other ways to adjust mash pH, such as with chemical additives and grain choice, but that gets into some heavy duty brew science/water chemistry and you're better off just getting the basics under your belt for now. As long as you're in the 5.0-5.4 area you'll be fine.

And as far as pH testing I just use a roll of litmus paper I got from Amazon on the cheap. Yeah (to those of you tutting while reading this), I know it's not as fancy, accurate or compensating as a $300 lab grade, electronic pH meter, but it does the job I need it to do well enough. I'm making home brew, not working for NASA.

It's nice to see you're still into brewing and I hope you having a lot of fun expanding your knowledge and skill in your new found hobby.

Absolutely! Thanks for your help!

This gives me hope... My OG was suppose to be 1.043 and when I measured mine pre boil volume... I was at 1.030'ish... It worried me but if you say it should go up some, then I should have hit my numbers.

After the boil, I didn't cool it rapidly... I dumped it into my primary bucket and covered it to cool slowly over night. When I get home from work I was going to *pitch* the yeast. / silly

We will see how it turns out... I have very high hopes for this batch!