Grain bill and hop schedule help for unique beer

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Trails_n_Ales

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I'm planning on brewing a beet, ginger, lime beer this weekend and need help with a grain bill and hop schedule. It's a weird beer, but hey im brewing it for myself. Here is what I was planning to add to the boil of a 5gal batch:

1lb. beets 60
1oz fresh ginger 15min
2 limes' zest flameout

Yeast - White labs california ale

any suggestions on a grain bill or hop schedule that could work??
 
Not certain your going to get much from 1lb of beets in a 60 minute boil, except a lot of red sludge at the bottom of the kettle and a very red beer.

What I would be looking at would be a cereal mash.
Assuming this is going to be a pale ale with beets for flavor and color.
with ginger highlights and a lime zing.

Main Mash
Pale Malt as base and a touch crystal 20 or 40 (7% to 10%) to add little color and sweetness. initial temp 138F
Cereal Mash
6 row and rice and beets --- use some of the strike water and start the cereal mash and bring to 128 to 131 and rest 30 minutes. Then heat to 151 and rest 30 minutes.
Meanwhile heat strike and start main mash....
then bring cereal mash to a boil and boil to 7 to 10 minutes no more (otherwise your beets become mush) add cereal mast to main mash to get to a temp of 151 rest for 1 hour...
hops .... go with earthy hops to match the taste of the beets... Brewers Gold or Goldings or EKG... and go easy no more then 20 to 25 IBU total. light bittering charge and rest flavor and aroma.

while beer ferment get about 1/2 lb beets clean, cut up and freeze.
When fermentation is complete remove beets from freezer put in pot with 1 quart of water and boil until they are mush ... add ginger and boil a little more. turn off heat and lime zest and chill to 70. Add to fermnenter with dry hops if you like.

freezing the beets will break their cells and release the flavor and color when boiled so you will get a good charge of beet color and flavor

good luck!
 
Awesome! so you think something like:

main mash
5lb maris otter
.5lb crystal 40

cereal mash
4lb 6row
2lb flaked rice
1lb beets
 
I would not use more than 1 lb 6 row in the cereal mash with the 1 lb rice and 1 lb beets. I normally use plain long grain white rice from the grocery store. The 6 row will help break the proteins down during the protein rest (128f to 131f) and then convert some of the sugars at the rest at 151f. So you can use more of the maris otter

but i am not familiar with the system you use, heard of grainfather but never seen or used one. I with a self built system and self written software...
 
I think a saison yeast would work very well with the ginger and lime. Their esters kind of match up depending on which strain you choose

For hops, are you trying to find a hop(s) that has flavors similar to those? Or something like a mild, spicy noble hop that wont get in the way?
 
Thanks brewer for the info. The grainfather is an all in one mash/boil kettle. I checked out your brew room thread. Very nice!!

Moops, I was looking for hops that wouldn't add too much complexity and kind of "work" with the beets, ginger, and lime - so yes, something that wouldnt get in the way. I was thinking about using california ale yeast for that same reason. Do you think using a saison yeast would put it over the top? what saison strain would you reccommend?
 
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