Belgium Winter Wit (experiment)

So I tried to do a Belgium Wit based seasonal beer. Below is my grain and hop bill for a 5 gal batch. To make it seasonal I added some spices during the last 15 mins of the boil. Not sure exactly what happened, but my best guess is that the figs and dates added sugar because I way over shot my gravity and ended up with a 1.080 OG. It's been in primary now a week and is still bubbling at about 8 per min. I am concerned that it won't finish out. I did do a starter of Wyeast Belgium wit, but it was my first starter so I don't know how well it's going to do. I am also a bit cold as my house is 300 years old and feels every bit of it. Carboy reads between 60 and 65. Should I try and raise the temp and if so to what? I was hopping to get more clove than banana, as that seemed better seeing how it's a winter seasonal. Also I heard some people add champagne yeast to finish higher gravity beers. Should I do that, my only concern is that it would dry it out too much and I think that some body would be fitting again seeing how it's a winter seasonal. Any advice would be awesome.

Grain
4.75 lbs Pale Malt (2 Row) Bel
4.75 lbs Wheat, Torrified
1.00 lbs Oats, Flaked
1.00 lbs White Wheat Malt
1.00 lbs. Munich Malt

Hops
0.50 ozs Hallertauer 60 mins
0.50 ozs Hallertauer 5 mins
0.50 ozs Crystal 60 mins
0.50 ozs Crystal 5 mins

 

Someone else may chime in with more specifics, but if I were in your position I'd be inclined to just give it some time and not worry too much. It's going to be a bigger beer, sure, but most beer yeasts will eventually chew through a 1.080 OG and finish out just fine. Have you taken a gravity reading yet to see where you're actually at?

My hunch is that you're probably getting close to being fermented out and if you just give it another 10 days to 2 weeks, it'll be about ready to keg/bottle. It may be a little "hot" from alcohol at that point and need a month or so of age to really reach its potential, but I think you'll be fine in the end.

edit: Haven't used that yeast specifically, but 60-65 should be just fine temperature-wise. In my (somewhat limited) experience with Belgian yeasts, it seems they develop better flavors at a slightly higher temp but mid-60s should work well for just about any ale yeast, Belgian included. If by some chance the fermentation seems to be stuck you might want to try to heat it up closer to 70 or so if you can to get it to finish up.

 

Thank you for your thoughts. I have not yet taken a gravity, maybe I will do that this weekend. Should I have any concern with having enough healthy yeast to successfully bottle condition. I also have quite a bit of trub on the bottom of the carboy, I think a lot sediment from hops as I used whole hops and I don't think my kettle screen did that great of a job. Is there any concern to the beer sitting on it too long?

 

A week is no problem at all for primary. Some folks here will leave a beer in primary for a month and I've read of people forgetting about a beer in a fermenter (is that really possible???) and discovering it the better part of a year later. If sanitation was good, they can even survive that long. I wouldn't suggest that but one week is nothing. Of course those thoughts generally involve the dead/dormant yeast settling to the bottom and not so much the trub, but neither will be a problem for you at this point.

My guess is you'll be fine for yeast for bottling as well, but for peace of mind it might not hurt to pitch some new yeast in. If it's easy enough for you to pick up a neutral strain for bottling (US-05 or Nottingham dry yeast come to mind), it couldn't hurt, but may not really be necessary. FWIW, I've bottled two barleywines in the past, one about 9% and another well north of 10% (don't remember the exact ABV) without bottling yeast and both carbed with no problem. The former was a liquid yeast (Wyeast Irish Ale I think?) and the latter was US-05 dry yeast.

 

Thank you for the info. I can't wait to drink this as the wort tasted great so I hope the finished product is just as good.

 

I leave my beers in primary for 21 days and rack directly to keg or bottle. In your case the bubbling doesn't mean that fermentation is not complete, only that there is trapped Co2. I'm sure the additional gravity came for the fruit causing your higher that expected OG. Only a hydrometer reading over three days of equal value can tell you if it's finished.
Chances are that it hasn't finished with that high of an OG but again, you need to check.
I would suggest leaving it for another week and gradually raising the temperature up to 68*f - 70*F over that period of time. Rousing the yeast as you go. A couple degrees per day, then another week at that temp. and check your hydrometer reading.
You should have plenty of yeast in suspension for bottling.
Champagne yeast will dry it out and you don't want that in a Wit.

 

Awesome! Thanks for the info. I have started raising the temp and should be good to bottle next weekend. Thanks again.

 

I would vote against champaign yeast too. It may dry it out too much. The best thing is to do is taste it when you think it is finished dropping gravity in primary. If it's too sweet, then decide weather or not to add a yeast that will dry it out. It will taste sweeter uncarbonated, but you'll get an idea if its just too heavy/thick sweet. Don't work about leaving beer on the primary's yeast and trub for a few weeks. Yeast is actually cleaning up its own byproducts and will clean up some of the flavor if you wait.