I hate hearing that styles aren't meant to be messed with. If that was the case, the world would have a lot less options for beer. Somebody had to try something different at some point, otherwise there would only be one style if beer.
While that's kind of what I'm saying, it's only part. The other, larger part has nothing to do with American Wheat - you can brew an American Wheat IIPA, and I encourage you to do so - but more to do with how ingredients play with/off one another in a complex beer like Witbier.
Really, I'm not saying styles aren't meant to be messed with. More on that later, though.
My inspiration for this beer is the Belgian beers that set being made with American hops. Bruery mischief, captain Lawrence xtra gold, Belgian IPAs, etc. I don't particularly like the Belgian IPAs as the bitterness doesn't blend well with the yeast. However, the Belgian styles that used a late hop addition with low bitterness turned out nicely.
There are many Belgian ales made with American hops. Frankly, my palate likes none of them, and that plays an important role in my opinion of them. More importantly, though, is this: None of the beers referenced above have spices. None of them are wheat beers. They're simply malt, sugar, hops, water and yeast;
they're all pale ales (Tripel is pale and it's an ale
). They don't have the added layers of complexity provided by wheat (malted and unmalted), oats (possibly), lactic acid and brewing spices.
Now like you said, 2nd of citra might overwhelm. If you saw some of my previous posts, I actually asked about that. I only thought of that big of an addition because I was not dry hopping, and some aroma would be scrubbed during fermentation. I was thinking of cutting back to an oz, so the coriander, orange peel, and hops would maybe blend better.
There's where you and I differ. When I put spices in a beer, I want the spices to shine. In a spiced Belgian-style ale, I want to show off two flavors: Spices and yeast esters. Hops just get in the way of that.*
See, if too many things are going on in the beer, it's not "complex"; it's confusing. When you mix a few flavors, it's relatively simple to achieve a synergy or balance. You're talking about mixing a whole gamut of flavors. It's hard enough to brew a good Witbier. Master that first, then see where adding your late hops gets you.
Think of flavors like paint colors. Mix yellow and blue, you get green. Vary the proportions, you get varying shades of green. Add in a bit of red, and you get a quite different hue that's still recognizably green. Now add all the colors in your paint box. What do you end up with? A kind of grayish-brown that doesn't look like anything nice. The same thing happens when you start throwing too many flavors into a beer (or food). Instead of a broad spectrum of flavors, you end up with muddy, gray "blah".
But if you think that I shouldn't do it because of style guidelines, you're just talking to the wrong person. I don't believe in being restricted to guidelines because winning ribbons is of no interest to me. Brewing interesting beers is more important. And if it doesn't work, chalk it up to experience.
It ain't about ribbons. In fact, like etiquette, beer style isn't about
you.
It's not about restricting you or cramping your creative vision or any other of that drivel. It's about
other people. It's about
respecting other people and their expectations.
More accurately, I'm worried about what you
call the beer when you hand it to the drinker. If you serve me your late-hopped Belgian-style spiced wheat beer and call it a Witbier, I'm not going to be impressed with your creativity and thinking-outside-the-boxness; I'm going to think you don't know how to brew a good Witbier. Subconsciously, I'm going to think you misled me.
I think you could brew a far more interesting Witbier by varying the spices other than hops. Sure, you need a certain amount of hops, coriander and bitter orange peel. But there are other spices than hops which blend really well with the
de rigeur spices. Paradise seed. Lemongrass. Lemon balm. Rosemary. Star anise. White pepper. Bay leaf. Cloves. Ginger. All these and more have been used in Witbier.
If you get creative with spices other than hops, you'll still have something discernibly Witbier which is also
much more interesting than your run-of-the-mill Hoegaarden.
Now, it's true I've been scratching my head about this trend to hop the **** out of everything I've been seeing for the past decade. I find it disturbing, not innovative. There are some places extra hops simply don't belong. Just like there are some places garam masala or red chili powder or sugar don't belong. You wouldn't dump Tabasco sauce on Frosted Flakes; Frosted Flakes only taste "right" with milk on 'em, right?
It's more disturbing when perfectly good beers go by the wayside because the beer geeks can't train their two remaining taste buds to appreciate anything that doesn't have 100 IBU or excessive finishing hops. The first brewery for which I made wort let a half-dozen different outstanding beers lapse out of the portfolio because people couldn't get enough of the beer which we first made as a joke (we added 4 times the finishing and dry hops to a cask of our American IPA). We lost our ESB, APA, all the way
up to and including the American IPA the over-hopped beer was based on.
I'm to the point I don't even go to my local homebrew club's meetings anymore. Out of the dozens of brewers who attend, there might be one decent Brown Ale or ESB out of dozens of Raspberry Imperial Gose or some other crazy-huge, barely drinkable junk. Trouble is, half these guys can't really brew their way out of a paper bag
unless it's some humongous batsh!t recipe. Ask 'em to brew a Pale Mild and they'd fail. Utterly.
Don't get me wrong, now; there are times I enjoy an Imperial Stout or big IPA or Belgian-style Quadruppel or funky, Brett-y whatsit. But for most occasions, give me a session ale or Witbier. Hell, even American Wheat! The damned shame is that stuff is rare in the craft scene, at least around here, because people are too busy brewing big beers with names like "Thermonuclear HopBCM".
Cheers,
Bob
* And before you go there, no, hops are
not just another spice.