Honey Peach American Wheat - feedback please

Hi! We can call this a recipe Sanity check. Been a while since brewing, been even longer since doing a wheat beer..... (longer, as in 'never').

5lbs Wheat DME (which I believe is 65 wheat 35 pale malt).
Aiming for bout 15 IBUs from a single hop addition (undecided neutral hop variety), 1.046 OG, Wyeast 1056. All very (and intentionally) basic up to this point.

It's the next two parts I need some feedback on:
In the primary, I will add 1/2 lb of honey Ferment to completion.
Rack to Secondary on top of 3lbs of peach puree. Giving it a good week or so after the secondary fermentation ceases, and transferring to keg.

My goal here is to have a nice drinkable American Wheat peach. Peach should be noticeable but in the background. Not way back like a drummer, but not in your face like an 80's metal frontman, either. Maybe like a solid bassist. lol.
Some people seem to get a sour or overly tart taste with the peaches, and I am hoping my addition of honey in the primary (as opposed to in the boil) will help balance that.

Also toying with the idea of Wyeast1010 instead of the 1056, but I want to keep it simple and that adds another layer of complexity to analyzing it's taste for later tweaking.

Not enough honey? Too basic a base recipe? Bad idea all together? Different yeast entirely? I welcome all input!
Thanks!

Looks fine. Peach is pretty subtle, I've done basically your recipe minus the honey with 6 lb of oregon peach puree for 5 gals and it wasn't in your face. The honey will likely just ferment out, so I wouldn't expect any sweetness from it if that's what you were referring to. I use 1010 a lot, it's pretty neutral and not really a lot different from 1056 though it does seem to add just a touch of tartness. So if trying to avoid tart maybe you do want 1056.

chickypad said:

Looks fine. Peach is pretty subtle, I've done basically your recipe minus the honey with 6 lb of oregon peach puree for 5 gals and it wasn't in your face. The honey will likely just ferment out, so I wouldn't expect any sweetness from it if that's what you were referring to. I use 1010 a lot, it's pretty neutral and not really a lot different from 1056 though it does seem to add just a touch of tartness. So if trying to avoid tart maybe you do want 1056.

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Thanks. Just figured the peach would be the showcase, not the esters from yeast, so i will probably stick with california ale yeast.
i made the mistake of throwing too many unknowns in my last beer (a belgian IPA) and the flavor has so much going on - and not in a good way - that i don't know what to tweak. So my new approach is to start basic and add one or MAYBE two new ideas.

kgg_033 said:

Some people seem to get a sour or overly tart taste with the peaches, and I am hoping my addition of honey in the primary (as opposed to in the boil) will help balance that.

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As was stated by Chickypad that honey's sweet is going to ferment out.

Also, when I think about the flavors involved with honey I would describe it as a complex mixture of very slightly bitter, moderately tart/sour with a lot of sweet. After fermentation the sweet is gone which should leave very slightly bitter and tart/sour.

The honey might actually do the opposite of what you expect. I actually use dark honey (even more tart than blonde honey) and molasses (very tart) to give my Stouts a coca cola type tart.

Disclaimer: Taste can be very, very different from person to person.

Dee_Lynn

It takes A LOT of peach to make a beer in-your-face-peach.

I brew a peach wheat every year, and even with 5 pounds of frozen peaches, I still finish it off with some peach extract. 1010 is my yeast of choice with that one.

I think the honey is just going to ferment out, making your beer stronger and drier. Personally, I'd leave it out.

A bit of lactic acid at kegging will make the peach flavors pop. Not too much, because then you'll make it overly tart.

Good luck.

Thank you all for the feedback.
In weighing all of the responses, I have decided to leave the honey out for now.
It's going to help me in the long run to do a batch without first, so I can better understand the impact of doing a batch with honey later on.

I'll follow up after its done.