Belgian Honey Blonde Ale

[Bsuechting]

Seeking feedback on my first self-crafted beer recipe I want to do a Blonde Ale in the Belgian Style using honey, rather than the traditional sugar to increase the abv.

Here's a style guide:
http://www.bjcp.org/2008styles/style18.php

I'm concerned that my recipe will be too sweet for the style, but as I have no experience with the adjunct malts, I have no frame of reference. Things I've considered are: replacing the honey malt with biscuit or Vienna and eliminating the aromatic, mainly to reduce the srms and limit sweetness. I'm uncertain about the percentages in the bill. Also uncertain when to add the honey. Should it be added to the wort after boil or should I add it to the secondary? I want the sugars in the honey to be as fully converted as possible.

Belgian Honey Blonde
Partial Mash
ABV 7.52
OG 1.071
EFG 1.014
Srm 5.8
IBU 21
5gal batch
Mash in 155F
Rest 60min at 150F
Sparge at 175F

Grain Bill
4oz aromatic malt (2.3%)
7.2oz Carapils (4.1%)
4oz honey malt (2.3%)
6lbs Pilsner liquid extract (54.8%)
1lbs Belgian Pilsner Malt (9.1%)
2lbs Belgian Wheat Malt (18.3%)

Hop Schedule
1oz hallertau (50min)
.25 tettnang (45min)
.3oz east Kent goldings (30min)

Preferred Yeast
Brewtek cl0300 Belgian Ale #1

Misc
1lb honey

Any advice would be most welcome

 

[orangehero]

Firstly, welcome.

Proportions of specialty malts look generally reasonable to me.

Skip the Carapils as the liquid extract probably has some anyway. Additionally the wheat malt is going to contribute improvements in mouthfeel and head retention.

On that note that's a fairly large amount of wheat, but not necessarily too much. 5-10% (~ 1 lb) is probably more typical.

The easiest way to handle the honey would be to add it at the end of the boil. Make sure you stir very thoroughly so that it dissolves. In order to preserve the delicate aromatics of the honey one should add it as late as possible. Adding it at the tail end of primary fermentation would also work, and help preserve the aromatics even more, but you risk having the honey not wholly dissolving and just sinking to the bottom.

There's no reason to do the two bittering additions, unless you're just using up what you have. Do a single bittering charge, even through first wort hopping, and your flavor addition at 30 minutes. You could even do a small aroma additions at 5 minutes. Personally I like a little more noble hop punch and complexity in my Belgian Blonde so I do FWH, 30 min, 15 min, and 5 min additions.

I don't know what kind of fermentation control capabilities you have, but to help the yeast attenuate properly after about 3 days raise the fermentation temperature a few degrees.

 

[Bsuechting]

Thanks for the warm welcome and advice orangehero! Good point about the Carapils, hadn't thought of that. Given your input, I see a few options going forward:

1. Add all the honey after boil and bottle condition with honey
2. Add 75% of the honey after boil and then boil some water, dissolving the remaining 25% in the warm water and adding it to the secondary prior to siphon
3. Some combination of the two

Probably gonna go with the second option as I've read it can be quite difficult to condition with honey