Blood Orange Hefeweizen

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gnedge

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Recipe from "Extreme Homebrewing" by Sam Caglione of Dogfish Head Brewery. The book is copywritten, so I don't believe I can share the recipe.

I brewed this beer ten days ago and today my two brothers in law and I kegged it, force carbonated it and drank it. Fantastic, easy brew. Here are some photos of the brew and sampling:

Ingredients ready to go:
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Brew Kettle coming to a boil:
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Four blood oranges cut, ready to be zested and sliced:
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Wort boiling, oranges and orange rinds steeping:
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Wort chiller in action:
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Ready for yeast pitching:
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Ready to be sealed:
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Finished, kegged and ready to be served:
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Finished Product - still tastes a little green but whoa what an amazing beer:
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All in all, this is an amazing tasting beer. Very easy to make and an incredible flavor.
 
Recipe from "Extreme Homebrewing" by Sam Caglione of Dogfish Head Brewery. The book is copywritten, so I don't believe I can share the recipe.

This is from U.S. Copyright Office - Copyright Protection Not Available for Names, Titles, or Short Phrases (Circular 34)

Mere listings of ingredients, as in recipes, labels, or formulas. When a recipe or formula is accompanied by explanation or directions, the text directions may be copyrightable, but the recipe or formula itself remains uncopyrightable.

So, it is my opinion that the recipe is OK to post. You would have to put the directions in your own words.
 
Just to make sure....

The recipe above calls for 6.6lbs of Wheat LME. Usually the fermentability of LME is 80% and the specific brand listed in the recipe is 80%. So, converting this to DME would require 5.28lbs of Wheat DME. Correct?
 
Sounds and looks good.

So how much of the rinds did you use? Most recipies call for only using the "orange" part of the peel. More like the zest. Did you only use the zest or did you use more of the rind?

I'm assuming you poured in the entire contents of your orange peel steep into the fermentor, bag of rinds and all. yes?
 
Here's the recipe I used:

This is from the book and it's very verbose.

Ingredients

Preboil Tea
4 gallons water

Boil
6.6 pounds (3kg) light liquid wheat extract (55% wheat malt and 45% barley malt) (65 minutes)
1/2 ounce (15g) Hallertau hop pellets (60 minutes)
1/2 ounce (15g) Saaz hop pellets (20 minutes)
4 average sized blood oranges (20 minutes in another pot)
1/2 ounce (15g) Hallertau hop pellets (10 minutes)

In carboy
Cool water to the 5-gallon (19L) mark

Fermentation
Yeast: Wyeast 3068 or 3638; or White Labs WLP300 or WLP380

Bottling
5 ounces (125 g) priming sugar

STARTING GRAVITY: 1.050
FINAL GRAVITY: 1.12
FINAL TARGET ABV: 4.8%

PROCESS
1. Heat 4 gallons (15L) of water in the brewpot. As the water begins to boil, remove it from heat. Add the light wheat malt extract. Stir to prevent clumping and scorching o the bottom of the pot. Return the pot to heat.

2. Allow the wort to come up to a boil. After pre-boiling for 5 minutes, add the first Hallertau hop pellets and stir. Start timing the 1-hour boil at the point that you make this hop addition.

3. 20 minutes before the end of the boil, add the Saaz hop pellets.

4. Peel the blood oranges and separate sections of fruit. Discard half of the peels. Cut the remainder of peel and fruit sections into small pieces. Use a grater as you only want the orange part of the rind. The white will add extreme bitterness. They should be small enough to allow easy entry into the carboy in a later step. An alternative is to use a plastic fermentation bucket that would allow easier addition of the fruit. When using a plastic fermenter with a large lid, the size of the fruit is not a concern.
The fruit may be placed in a straining bag for easy removal after fermentation. Heat fruit and peels in 1/2 gallon (2L) of water to 160 degrees F (71C) and then turn off heat. Let it steep as it cools.

5. 10 minutes before the end of the boil, add the second Hallertau hop pellets and stir for 1 minute.

6. At the 60-minute mark, turn off hte heat source, stir the wort clockwise for 2 minutes as you build up a whirlpool effect. Stop stirring and allow the wort to sit for 10 minutes.

7. Chill the wort in a cold water bath to a temperature of 70F-75F (21C - 24C).

8. Transfer the wort into a carboy or a plastic fermenter. Pour blood orange peels and fruit into the wort.

9. Aerate for 1 minute.

10. Pitch the yeast into the carboy and aerate for another minute. Top up the carboy to a 5-gallon (19L) mark with cool water.

11. In about 10 days, your beer should be ready to package.
 
Sounds and looks good.

So how much of the rinds did you use? Most recipies call for only using the "orange" part of the peel. More like the zest. Did you only use the zest or did you use more of the rind?

I'm assuming you poured in the entire contents of your orange peel steep into the fermentor, bag of rinds and all. yes?

I did it a little differently than the recipe suggested. Trying to remove the white part of the rind is a nightmare, and using a grater is a good way to slice your finger open.

So I used a zester and zested all of the oranges and put the zest, along with the chunks of orange in a muslin bag, then poured the whole pot of stuff into the fermenter, aerated it and then added the yeast.
 
Just to make sure....

The recipe above calls for 6.6lbs of Wheat LME. Usually the fermentability of LME is 80% and the specific brand listed in the recipe is 80%. So, converting this to DME would require 5.28lbs of Wheat DME. Correct?

I used DME, and used the 80% formula, so yes - I used 5.28lbs of DME.
 
I was planning on brewing a hefe tomorrow anyway and this seems like a fun one to try. But I've learned that blood oranges are out of season and didn't find any at the two produce marts I went to yesterday. Anyone see any issue with just using some nice Valencia oranges instead?
 
jvh261: Different type of orange, different flavor, different color. On the other hand, it should taste perfectly good. In my experience, blood oranges tend to be a bit tarter (but still sweet). Plus, their flesh is a nice red color that will impart to the beer. However, other oranges will also probably be good. I see no reason why you couldn't try and let us know!
 
Cool. I just smacked my pack of 3638 and will be brewing this with the Valencias later on today.
 
Brew went as planned...just subbed Valencias for Blood Oranges. Used a peeler to zest the peels, paring them just wasn't working out. Tough to keep the white stuff out. Guess I'll see how "orange" this turns out in about 10 days. Thanks for this post...kinda inspired me to try something different. I've used a little lemon zest in hefes before, but never thrown a muslin bag full of oranges and zest into the fermenter... why the hell not?

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The pith just adds a touch of bitterness. The ginger brew recipe I used recently called for putting the pith of lemons in for 20 minutes of the boil.

If you really get into zesting a lot citrus, I find the best tool in my repertoire to be a microplane. Here is the actual "zester". However, I like the bigger plane. I find them to be very useful.

Looks like a good brew so far!
 
Someone asked for the all-grain version...Beersmith converts it as follows:

Type: All Grain
Batch Size: 5.00 gal
Boil Size: 5.88 gal
Boil Time: 60 min
Brewhouse Efficiency: 75.00

Ingredients

5.09 lb Pale Malt (3.0 SRM) Grain 61.46 %
3.19 lb Wheat Malt, Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 38.54 %
0.50 oz Hallertauer Mittelfrueh [4.50 %] (60 min) Hops 10.1 IBU
0.50 oz Saaz [4.30 %] (20 min) Hops 3.2 IBU
0.50 oz Hallertauer Mittelfrueh [4.50 %] (10 min) Hops 2.0 IBU
4.00 items Blood Orange (Secondary 10.0 days) Misc
1 Pkgs Weihenstephan Weizen (Wyeast Labs #3068) Yeast-Wheat


Beer Profile

Est Original Gravity: 1.046 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.011 SG
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 4.56 %
Bitterness: 15.3 IBU Calories: 43 cal/pint
Est Color: 4.1 SRM
 
I am interested in brewing a 10 gallon batch. Could I just double the amount of water, and ingredients during the 60 minute boil?
 
Just got done closing the fridge door to let this stuff ferment. I did the same thing using Valencias instead of the blook orange since that was available. First time adding fruit into the wort for me too, but it smelt awesome!! cant wait to keg this one!
 
I had this beer at the Xtreme brick and mortar shop in Delaware- Doug the proprietor poured me one for shopping.

INCREDIBLE beer. It is number four on the list.

And one HECK of a store! Doug and co. are awesome.
 
Not with over 8 pounds of malt, and hops it doesn't... Looks pretty good to me. :)
 
it seems blood oranges are pretty tough to come by right now, anyone have suggestions on other types of oranges to use?
 
Anyone looking to pick up the book, I found it on the discount rack at Barns and Noble for under $9. I was not seeking it out, but could not pass it up.
 
After you finish steeping the oranges do you add the steeping water and the fruit to the fermenter? Or just the zest and fruit?? Planning on giving this a try tomorrow..
 
After you finish steeping the oranges do you add the steeping water and the fruit to the fermenter? Or just the zest and fruit?? Planning on giving this a try tomorrow..

Pour the whole thing in.

Then top off the fermenter to 5 G per the directions. Agree, the directions aren't very clear on this poit.
 
Came out great. Here's the finished product w/ the Valencia substitution.

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i ordered a Bavarian Hefe Weizen Extract Kit

6 lbs. Wheat Malt Syrup
1 lbs. Wheat Dry Malt Extract

1 oz. Sterling (60 min)

Safbrew WB-06

I originally was going to add orange and lemon zest to the boil untill i found this recipe. would the blood oranges added to the above recipe be a good idea?

this would be my first heff.

thanks
 
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