Light Wheat Recipe help

I am brewing for a friend's wedding. One for him and one for her. For hers (she's not a huge beer drinker) I am working on a simple extract recipe with fruit. I am still waiting to see what fruit she wants so may edit slightly to match, but I going for a light beer with a hint of wheat beer like flavor. I am not a wheat beer drinker so do not have much experience here. She likes things like Blue Moon and Belgian white ales more than yeasty Hefes.

I threw this together...

Amount Item Type % or IBU
5.00 lb Extra Light Dry Extract (3.0 SRM) Dry Extract 60.61 %
1.00 lb Wheat Dry Extract (8.0 SRM) Dry Extract 12.12 %
1.00 lb Cara-Pils/Dextrine (2.0 SRM) Grain 12.12 %
1.00 lb Crystal Maris Otter (55.0 SRM) Grain 12.12 %
0.25 lb Caramel Malt - 80L 6-Row (Briess) (80.0 SRM) Grain 3.03 %
0.50 oz Magnum [14.00 %] (60 min) Hops 23.2 IBU

My questions:
1) How much "wheat" flavor is provided by yeast vs extract?
2) What would be a good yeast to give a mild, white ale type flavor?
3) How do you think C80 will work vs another Crystal?

Thanks for critique in advance!

I thought you said you were working on a "simple recipe." ?

2-1/4 lbs of crystal will not a light beer make. Cut your total crystal malts - including the carapils - to 1/2 lb or less. Light DME (usually) has some carapils in it already. Your wheat extract will help with head retention too. So I'd just dump the carapils altogether.

Honestly, great wheat beer can be made easily with extract alone. If you're going to fruit this beer, that's what I'd recommend. Among my friends and family the most popular beer I've made is an all extract ginger wheat beer.

A lot of the flavor people associate with wheat beer comes from the yeast. If you use an American ale yeast such as WY1056 or WLP001 you'll get a nice clean flavor, without the esters (or cloudiness) associated with hefeweizen.

I have brewed wheat beers in the past and both times the only extract I used was wheat DME. It should give you that big wheat spice but if you want a hint, I would up the amount of wheat or lower the proportion of the caramel malts because it looks like they will give the wheat a run for its money.

For wheat beers I usually use Caramel 10 L, which imparts more of a candy sweetness rather than the heavier caramel flavor of Caramel 60 L and above. And I may be wrong but I think that some of those caramel malts in your recipe will darken the drink, detracting from the idea that it will be a light beer. Goodness knows that mind games are important for people who are not dedicated beer drinkers!

If you are going for that Belgian Wit aroma you have two things to think about; yeast and spices. If you want the yeast dimension, look into WY3944, WLP400 or WLP410. If you want the spices think about sweet orange peel, coriander and possibly ginger. The latter is possibly a good avenue to take if you combine it with a clean yeast from the previous post in order to keep the beer as clear as possible.

Also keep in mind that the everything ought to compliment the fruit you are planning on using!

You have to consider what kind of wheat extract you're using. Some wheat extract is actually 60 percent 2 row. Most others are only 60 percent wheat.

So id significantly up the wheat extract, since about half is already pale malt. And then id use a little dextrin or crystal 10 if you want to add some color or body.

More importantly I think is the yeast selection, and how you're adding fruit. Fruit extract?

Right. Different brands have different proportions, but "wheat" extract is always made from a combination of wheat and barley malts. Briess is 65% wheat; Muntons is 55% wheat; I couldn't find a breakdown for Alexander's quickly, but you get the idea.

Yeah you're right about the Carapils. I copied that and the C80 from a recipe I had laying around for Magic Hat #9 as a base. The Crystal Maris Otter was something I just saw come available and I wanted to try. As for simple, compared to my average all grain brew this is like coloring with crayons and sorry, the "light" was more for light in wheat character not necessarily light colored or light beer etc... The fruit angle hasn't been worked out, but I think possibly 3oz of peach extract at bottling.

I have updated my recipe to this....

Amount Item Type % or IBU
4.00 lb Wheat Dry Extract (8.0 SRM) Dry Extract 51.61 % (probably Munton's)
2.50 lb Extra Light Dry Extract (3.0 SRM) Dry Extract 32.26 %
1.00 lb Crystal Maris Otter (55.0 SRM) Grain 12.90 %
0.25 lb Caramel Malt - 80L 6-Row (Briess) (80.0 SRM) Grain 3.23 %
0.50 oz Magnum [14.00 %] (60 min) Hops 22.7 IBU
1 Pkgs American Ale II (Wyeast Labs #1272) Yeast-Ale

The newest version looks good to me - I've brewed a good number of light wheat and fruit flavored beers to appease my woman. Also - you shouldn't be worried about altering your recipe to match the type of fruit flavor the bride wants. The one you have now is so simple and light, any fruit will go fine with it.

I've actually done the same thing - came up with the simple/light malt and hop bill and then let her pick the fruit flavoring on the website of my LHBS. That also might be a big help for somebody making a lot of other decisions - "here is a list, pick one".

You could mess with fresh fruit (I'll be prepping and freezing strawberries myself this weekend), but I would recommend the extracts in light of your audience: wedding drinkers, particularly women - probably won't notice or really focus on the specific characteristics of the beer. They just want something fruity.

Given my experience with the extracts, I would recommend getting two (2) of the 2-oz bottles. When I've used only 2 oz, the flavor is faint - but more noticeable with 4 oz. You can add 2 oz to the keg, taste it; and always add more.

NO! Cut down on the crystal!!! A pound and a quarter of crystal will make your beer heavy and unnecessarily sweet in a cloying, sticks-to-the-roof-of-your-mouth kind of way. I know because I've done it.

I'd expect that the Maris Otter C55 is a C55 - caramelly, slightly fruity flavor - that happens to be made from Maris Otter.

I agree on there being too much crystal. Using something just to use it and not because you know it belongs in the beer/style/recipe isn't a good enough reason. That much medium-dark crystal won't leave much lightness in flavor, color, or mouthfeel. Save the crystal MO for a best bitter or brown ale.

Is it because of the wheat or beer style? Because I've used up to 2 lbs of specialty malt in 6 gallons of beer before and it was not cloying or overly sweet although it certainly depends on the malt. I believe this is similar to C55.

Crystal malts are specialty malts, but not all specialty malts are crystal malts. Crystal malts are basically mashed in the husk by the maltster, then kilned for varying degrees of color and flavor. The process converts most of the starch in the grain to unfermentable sugars, which add sweetness and body to the beer. (Some starch and fermentable sugar does remain in the malt, but that's not what brewers are after when they use crystal malts, and the quantity is low compared to the unfermentable sugar.)

Other specialty malts, such as black, are not treated this way, and do not contribute unfermentable sugar. Then there are other specialty malts which are diastatic, such as biscuit, which technically should be mashed to convert fermentable sugar, but may be steeped to contribute flavor and color without an effect on the fermentables.

If you're routinely using 2 lbs/6 gal of crystal, you're pretty much the only one. Most of us find that 1lb is about the maximum. Or perhaps you're doing something wrong and not getting the full benefit from it. For example, your original recipe called for 1lb of carapils. Do you use that much routinely? Most of us will add 1/4lb to carapils to 5 gallons for a significant boost to head and body.