Two questions about wheat beer

Hi everyone,

I am boiling my first witbier. It's a modification of a popular recipe online:

4.5 lbs pale 2-row
3 lbs wheat malt
2 lbs flaked wheat
mash in 3.5 gal at 152
mash out 4 gal at 165

1 once cascade 60 min
1/2 once orange zest 15 min
3/4 once crushed coriander seeed 15 min
1 once cascade 5 min

First questions: I got very low pre-boil O.G. (1.033 when I was expecteing about 1.050). I think it is related to the crush of the wheat malt: there were still big chunks of wheat at the end of the mash. How fine does it need to be? Other ideas to explain the low OG?

Second question: I have been boiling for about an hour to concentrate the beer before I start adding stuff. I noticed a CRAZY amount of lipid/protein aggregates. Is this common for 'mostly-wheat' beer?

Thanks

The grain crush could certainly be part of the problem, I know it was for me recently. I did a hefeweizen that I noticed had quite a few grains that didn't look fully cracked or cracked at all, and this was at 38 on the grain mill at the LHBS. The next brew I crushed at 30 and got way better efficency (45% vs 80%), though I had a rather stuck mash that took some working to get all the wort drained since the crush was smaller.

As for the second point, you'll typically get those proteins floating on top of the boil with most brews. Some people don't care, some scoop it off, no big deal.

Thanks Metanoia,

The batch is sealed and everything is cleaned. I ended up boiling it down to 1.046; it should be fine but I lost two 6-packs in the process

I'll try a finer crush next time. I couldn't say how fine it was (I am using a hand mill), finer than I would use on barley malt, but it looked pretty coarse. I ended up with 56% efficiency and I am normally between 75-80%. Our numbers seem pretty comparable.

It wasn't just foam floating at the surface, it was a storm of big flakes for the entire 3-h boil. I have seen big particles on other batches, but nothing like that. I ended up removing 3-inch long 'boogers' off the wort chiller. I guess I will lose a lot more beer when I rack this one.

I tasted great by the way, more bitter than I expected. I re-read the recipe and it called for orange peels and I used zest; that might be the issue.

Thanks again

Most likely your crush. wheat kernels are really small, I always run then through the mill twice, maybe three times if need be.

I agree, it's the crush of the wheat. The kernels are not only smaller than barley, they're harder too so it is a lot tougher to crush. When you do get them crushed finer for your next time, you'll need to add rice hulls to your mash because wheat has no hull to help create the filter bed and it's a bit more gooey than barley and is more likely to clog up when you drain your tun. The best solution in my mind is to do your wheat beers BIAB because the bag forms the filter and has such a large filter area that it doesn't clog.

Hot break can be different for different batches so what you are seeing with the big flakes is probably normal. Wheat is probably higher in protein than your barley so it might do better with a protein rest. If you want to do a multi-step mash, a beta glucan rest will help take some of the stickiness out too.

Orange peels add flavor to your wheat and I think they take the place of the orange zest for times when you don't have the fresh orange on hand to zest. That shouldn't be a problem and might taste better too.

This might be a stupid question, but when you zested the orange did you include any of the white, pithy part of the peel or were you able to get just the thin, orange outer part? I only ask because a few years ago I made a similar beer but with lemon peel instead of orange peel, and the white rind made the beer way more bitter than anticipated, and not in a pleasant, hoppy way. Just a thought.

Just the orange part. For some reason, I found a zester in the kitchen drawer. I'll let you know how it turns out

SWMBO bought a bag of soft white wheat berries for me to use. I don't have a mill, but her Blendtec claims it can crush grains. I've used it on pulse and really put the whack to the wheat, and it seems to do quite well. As there is no husk I'm not aware of any problems even turning it nearly into powder.

I have a MM2 on my Christmas list...

rodwha said:

SWMBO bought a bag of soft white wheat berries for me to use. I don't have a mill, but her Blendtec claims it can crush grains. I've used it on pulse and really put the whack to the wheat, and it seems to do quite well. As there is no husk I'm not aware of any problems even turning it nearly into powder.

I have a MM2 on my Christmas list...

Click to expand...

I suspect if the blendtech is like the grain atachment for a Kitchen Aid mixer, its designed to turn grains into flour for baking, instead of cracking the hill for mashing.

It is indeed used for turning grains into flour, but in their booklet it states that it can be used to "crack grains" and lists volume, setting, and time. It also lists pearled barley (???). The idea is making cereal and states it's only semi-uniform.

I would be hesitant to use it on barley or anything with a husk, but I've used it many times now on the wheat berries. It's hard to get a uniform brokenness and I do get a lot of powder. But it doesn't seem to be an issue, though I do BIAB which may be helpful with sparging as I don't use rice hulls unless using oatmeal or some such.

I agree with what others have said. You need a very good crush on wheat beers.

But be careful, that makes whet bears famous for stuck sparges, which are an industrial strength hassle. A handful of rice hulls in the mash is cheap insurance