American Wheat - thick mouthfeel, low FG

I just kegged a 10 day old American Wheat and although I know it's still green, I had to give it a taste.

The mouthfeel is ridiculously thick! Could this be because it's so green and the "thickness" is just some suspended yeast/hops/whatever or will it stay like this?

With OG/FG like this (OG 1.053, FG 1.008), you'd think it'd taste very light on the pallet right?


Here's the recipe...
[size=+2]First American Wheat[/size]
[size=+1]6-D American Wheat or Rye Beer[/size]



Size: 4.9 gal
Efficiency: 63.0%
Attenuation: 84.9%
Calories: 173.61 per 12.0 fl oz

Original Gravity: 1.053 (1.040 - 1.055)
|=====================#==========|
Terminal Gravity: 1.008 (1.008 - 1.013)
|=======#========================|
Color: 6.3 (3.0 - 6.0)
|=========================#======|
Alcohol: 5.9% (4.0% - 5.5%)
|============================#===|
Bitterness: 19.09 (15.0 - 30.0)
|============#===================|

[size=+1]Ingredients:[/size]
5 lbs Pale Wheat Malt
6 lbs American 2-row
1 lbs Crystal Malt 10°L
1 oz Hallertau (3.2%) - added during boil, boiled 60 min
1 oz Hallertau (3.2%) - added during boil, boiled 20 min
00 oz Hallertau (3.2%) - added during boil, boiled 15 min

[size=+1]Schedule:[/size]
Ambient Air: 70.0 °F
Source Water: 60.0 °F
Elevation: 0.0 m

00:29:28 Mash In - Liquor: 13.0 qt; Strike: 164.2 °F; Target: 150.0 °F
01:29:28 Saccharification Rest - Rest: 60.0 min; Final: 144.8 °F
01:38:25 Mash Out - Heat: 8.9 min; Target: 168.0 °F
02:23:25 Sparge - Sparge: 15.67 qt sparge @ 170.0 °F, 5.76 gal collected, 45.0 min; Total Runoff: 5.9 gal

[size=-1]Results generated by BeerTools Pro 1.0.28[/size]

Wow, that's pretty weird. Low gravity and very low mash temps. I mean anything below 150 should give you quite low FG and low mouthfeel. Do you add boiling water at all during the mash to keep temps up?
-Ben

SkaBoneBenny said:

Wow, that's pretty weird. Low gravity and very low mash temps. I mean anything below 150 should give you quite low FG and low mouthfeel. Do you add boiling water at all during the mash to keep temps up?
-Ben

Click to expand...

Oh, I didn't notice that I pasted in the temps. The temps were actually between 155-160.

Nope, no need to add boiling water here...it was about 110 outside when I brewed this

155-160f mash is why you got such a thick, mouthy beer. Your beta amylase enzymes got denatured and couldn't do any starch conversions leaving only alpha amylase. This will leave a significant amount of your malt starch unconverted and as a result you have a lot of that thick bodied, mouth feel.

Next time keep your mash down toward 150-153 for a thinner, lighter feel.

JimC said:

155-160f mash is why you got such a thick, mouthy beer. Your beta amylase enzymes got denatured and couldn't do any starch conversions leaving only alpha amylase. This will leave a significant amount of your malt starch unconverted and as a result you have a lot of that thick bodied, mouth feel.

Next time keep your mash down toward 150-153 for a thinner, lighter feel.

Click to expand...

Are you sure about this? I was under the impression that it was not mouthfeel because of a lack of conversion but because the higher temps created more unfermentable types of sugar (is dextrins the term?). Again, I'm not all that sure, please, let me know. I am curious about this in fact.

"Are you sure about this? I was under the impression that it was not mouthfeel because of a lack of conversion but because the higher temps created more unfermentable types of sugar (is dextrins the term?). "

Higher temps favour Alpha amylase and denature beta amylase.

Alpha amylase converts starches to fermentable sugars and to dextrins but without the beta amylase in a stable state where they can further convert them into fermentable sugars, the dextrins remain in the wort.

Hence, high temps mean unconverted dextrins in the wort which means thicker mouth feel, sweeter finished beer etc.

I agree with what Nostrildamus said. If you had alot of dextrins though your FG should be higher as they aren't fermentable. Did you correct your FG reading for temperature?

wheat beers always have more mouth fill to me.with 1.008 I doubt you had alot of unfermentables.

Yeah that is odd. I have never seen that low an FG with that high a mash temperature. To boot, 1 lb of Crystal should leave more residuals than 1.008? What yeast did you use? 85% is not common for most strains.

I could be that your mash temp wasn't really what you thought it was. How do you take your readings?

After thinking about this, once this clears I am guessing the thickness is going to drop. A low FG such as you have is really going to strip a lot of the mouthfeel out. So I'd say (assuming I am on track) is that you bottle or keg before the yeast falls completely out of suspension if you want to retain some of that effect. In the bottle it can be resuspended by swirling.

This is something I've been struggling with for awhile now.

Most of you won't believe this but I've had both my thermometer and my hydrometer checked by my LHBS and they're both correct.

When I mash at 155 I end up with extreamly low FG, we're talking 1.003.
Mashing at 160 I've noticed that I get about 1.008-1.010 FG.

I don't know what's happening.. I've even sent a sample of my yeast to a buddy who has a phd in microbiology and he didn't see any critters that shouldn't be there; in fact, he said my sample was cleaner than most he's seen. (he analyzes samples for large breweries too.)

shlap said:

This is something I've been struggling with for awhile now.

Most of you won't believe this but I've had both my thermometer and my hydrometer checked by my LHBS and they're both correct.

When I mash at 155 I end up with extreamly low FG, we're talking 1.003.
Mashing at 160 I've noticed that I get about 1.008-1.010 FG.

I don't know what's happening.. I've even sent a sample of my yeast to a buddy who has a phd in microbiology and he didn't see any critters that shouldn't be there; in fact, he said my sample was cleaner than most he's seen. (he analyzes samples for large breweries too.)

Click to expand...

Yeah, I think I recall you posting about that. One thought, sounds crazy I know, but have you checked a sample of the water you brew with to be certain the gravity is 1.00? I have no idea if that is even possible that your water would measure off, but hey it seems like everything else has been tried.

Bumping a very old thread here, but I just had the same problem. Brewed up an RyePA and the mouthfeel is super thick despite a FG of 1.006 - S-05 did work.

I had assumed that gravity and mouthfeel had to proportional, so anyone have any ideas?

My recipe:
8.5 lb 2 row
2.0 flaked rye
1.5 60L
1.5 Golden Naked Oats
14 oz corn sugar (which I thought would dry/thin it out - but it did not).

mashed at 154* for 1 hour.

the taste is great, but this is like the thickest beer i've ever had. any ideas?

Is yours carbed/conditioned? In my experience a warm, green and completely flat beer always seems rather thick thick compared to what comes out of the bottle a couple weeks later. Remember carbonation level and temperature both affect mouthfeel significantly.

I force carb in kegs. It is still a little undercarbed, but close enough that i don't think that's the problem.

The beer is still green, but i've never had a beer this thick at any point. I will grab another sample to re-check the gravity, but i'm sure it was low. I checked it at 1.008 and 1.006 a couple days later and then let it sit another 3 days before racking to keg.

shawshank24 said:

Bumping a very old thread here, but I just had the same problem. Brewed up an RyePA and the mouthfeel is super thick despite a FG of 1.006 - S-05 did work.

I had assumed that gravity and mouthfeel had to proportional, so anyone have any ideas?

My recipe:
8.5 lb 2 row
2.0 flaked rye
1.5 60L
1.5 Golden Naked Oats
14 oz corn sugar (which I thought would dry/thin it out - but it did not).

mashed at 154* for 1 hour.

the taste is great, but this is like the thickest beer i've ever had. any ideas?

Click to expand...

The mouthfeel is from the Rye. Large protien molecules or beta-glucans or some other mysterious thing that I've no real knowledge of.

I've made rye IPAs plenty, and I know what you mean. I have a batch that I'm cold crashing in which I replaces some of the 2-row with sugar to lighten the beer. We'll see how that turns out.

passedpawn said:

The mouthfeel is from the Rye. Large protien molecules or beta-glucans or some other mysterious thing that I've no real knowledge of.

I've made rye IPAs plenty, and I know what you mean. I have a batch that I'm cold crashing in which I replaces some of the 2-row with sugar to lighten the beer. We'll see how that turns out.

Click to expand...

i did a raspberry wheat with a similar % of flaked rye that wasn't thick like this. i am actually suspecting the golden naked oats - 10% of my grainbill, which i think is too much, even though everything i find on it says to use up to 15%.

no, that can't be right either. i used 8.5% GNO in my black saison, and it doesn't have crazy body like this... although i believe i mashed the saison and the rasp wheat at lower temps, probably a shade over 150, and the IPA was at 154...

maybe it's the combination of GNO and flaked rye?

i just double checked the gravity and it is at 1.005. it is just blowing my mind that it could be that 'thin' and yet it has the mouthfeel of a damned milkshake.