red wheat brew

I grew up farming in western Kansas and my family still farms out there and grow red winter wheat. Looking ahead I'd like to brew a good American wheat beer using some of my dad's wheat. Anyone want to help me formulate a recipe or help me out with suggestions? It would be most appreciated. I think it would be fun to make this an annual harvest beer. Cheers

 

I use Breiss red wheat malt in most of my wheat beer recipes and I love the flavor of it. I don't see why you couldn't use it in place of unmalted wheat in a witbier or something.

 

A wit is a good way to start, but you can use wheat like an adjunct in most beers. I use my dad's raw wheat all the time, but always do a cereal mash to make sure it converts. Wheat in western Ks is pretty high in protein, so you may have some haze in the beers. Check out Mosher's Radical Brewing for a few ideas on using adjunct grains.

 

Anyone have a good wit recipe that calls for unmalted wheat?

 

50/50 wheat and malt is what I usually do. Wheat gelatinizes below mashing temp so you don't have to do a cereal mash. Depending on your MT you may want to add some rice hulls to aid lautering and sparging.

 

I've used this recipe before and it turned out pretty well, someone told me a little hoppy for a wit but I like the way the saaz and the spices go together

4 lbs pilsner
4 lbs unmalted wheat
8 oz crystal 10L
1 oz saaz at 60
1 oz saaz at 10
1 oz saaz at flame out
1 tsp corriander at 15
1 tsp grains of paradise at 15
1 oz bitter orange peel at 10
white labs 400

Edit: also a pound of rice hulls in the mash helps a lot

 

That looks good!


Who can tell me the differences between a wit and an American wheat?

 

The hops and yeast. A wit will use a belgian yeast, I like 3522, and noble hops very lightly. Then some corriander and orange peel in the last couple minutes of the boil.
An American wheat will use pretty much any yeast, and pretty much any hop, but many use the C hops for the citrusy aroma and flavor. Generally they are hopped more than the wit is.

 

The BJCP can

American Wheat

Belgian Wit

I didn't really read them, but I'm assuming the main differences can be found in the descriptions(I also have no idea what the real difference is, so that's all the help I am able to provide)

 

Here's my Wheat Stout in for another idea.

5 gals OG=1.065 FG=1.012 30.5 IBUs
5# Briess 2-row
2.5# Briess red wheat malt
2# Flaked wheat
0.5# Crystal 150L
0.25#chocolate malt
0.25#black patent
0.5# beet sugar

0.5oz Northern brewer hops 8.5%AA 60min
1oz Fuggle 5% 30 mins
Wyeast 1028 london ale yeast
mash at
122 20 mins, 154 30mins, 168 10 mins

 

Anyone want to critique this?

6lbs 2-row
3lbs wheat malt
3lbs red wheat (family grown)

I have no idea about a hop schedule so please advise. I would like to use American hops.

Want to get a house recipe going on this. So definitely willing to tweak but needed a place to start.

Thanks


PS check out my father's day gift.

 

Updated recipe please help:

4 lbs 2row
3 lbs 8 oz wheat malt
3 lbs red wheat
1 lb Rice hulls

2 tbs orange zest

.5 oz simcoe 60 min
.5 oz Amarillo 15 min
.25 oz cascade 5 min

 

Brew it!

 

That looks good. What are you planning for mash schedule?

 

Thinking single infusion @152 for 90 mins to make sure I can covert the unmakted wheat.

 

Might want to do a rest at 122

 

Never done a step mash.....not really sure I am comfortable with the process.

 

then a single at 152 will be fine.

 

what yeast are you going to use?

 

I'm curious about the crush and/or drying you do to the unmalted red wheat? Did you crush it like normal, twice, or not at all? Did you let it air-dry for a couple days/weeks?

 

I"m gonna run it thru twice because this stuff is hard. And this stuff is bone dry. It's been sitting in our seed wheat bin for almost a year before my dad brought it to me. I've read places that say you should cereal mash the unmalted wheat but I'm going to see how it works without that first.

 

Wyeast American wheat

 

So I finally brewed this tonight. Ended up only using 1tbs of orange zest. My OG is approximately 1.040.

I tasted my hydrometer sample and it was surprisingly bitter. Could I have over hopped this??

On another note I got to use my new IC tonight. 50' of 1/2" copper tubing. Cooled my worth to pitch in about9 mins! Awesome!

 

F*** I just realized I used a half ounce of cascade instead of a quarter oz. Is this gonna suck?

 

nope,it'll probally be better. at five minutes you're not getting much bittering at all from the hops, and both .25 and .5 are pretty small amounts of hops to begin with.

 

FYI. Wheat gelatinization temp is in the low 140's so you don't need to do a creal mash. I have made wheat beers with raw wheat both ways and there wasn't any difference in mash efficiency.