Crazy Buckwheat Gruit beer recipe - thoughts?

[Albionwood]

Brewing for a special performance of the medieval epic, "The Romance of Tristan and Iseult" in exactly one month. Since much of the story is associated with Brittany, and there is a famous buckwheat beer called "Telenn Du" (Black Harp) brewed in Brittany, and the performance is by harper Patrick Ball with early-music genius Shira Kammen... this is what I am planning to do:

5 lb Pilsen malt
3 lb Buckwheat malt
1 lb Buckwheat Munich malt
4 oz Midnight Wheat
1 lb Flaked Oats, toasted and maybe lightly smoked
1 lb Honey (added in secondary)

1 oz Saaz 60 min
1/2 oz Dandelion Root 60 min
1/2 oz Mugwort 60 min
2 oz dried Heather tips 20 min
1/2 oz dried Chamomile flowers 10 min

US-05 (slurry from a previous batch)

Some questions:
1. Do the herb additions look about right? I don't want to overpower this beer - it will be served to a public audience, not a bunch of brew geeks. I don't have much of the mugwort, probably not even the 1/2 oz I wanted.
2. Barley/Buckwheat ratio? I could increase the buckwheat or the buckwheat munich if desired.
3. Will it be too dry/thin without any crystal or dextrin malts?

Basically, any suggestions are welcome. I am also planning to brew up a "normal" beer, like a Marzen or similar, because this is likely to be too weird for most people.

 

[Albionwood]

Just checked and I do have almost an ounce of Mugwort, and a little over an ounce of Dandelion Root, so could add more of those if desired.

Another question: Mash schedule? Does anyone have experience mashing Buckwheat malt?

 

[Albionwood]

Brewing this right now. Changed the recipe a bit, added 1/2 lb of CaraMunich, increased Mugwort to 1 oz, and will use Kent Goldings instead of Saaz.

Did a mini-mash with the oats, as I didn't have enough flaked, so cereal mashed some steel-cut. Then mashed the whole works in at 140 and raised to 154F. It's pretty goopy at the start, hoping it thins out as it converts.

 

[dmtaylor]

No!! Recipe looked great, except I would ease off on the mugwort, because it is very strong. I have used it many times in the past. I would cut back to maybe just 1/4 oz mugwort -- less is more. Hope it's not too late.

 

[TasunkaWitko]

It looks great - I wouldn't mind trying that at all ~

My only suggestion, possibly for the future, would be to use or add dandelion leaves. I'd advise the use of these instead of the hops, which traditionally weren't used in gruits. I'm not sure if that is important or not, but just an FYI.

The recipe that I have for Dandelion Gruit says to use 7 leaves for a gallon of gruit. If you decide to try them, that might be a good starting point.

 

[dmtaylor]

The hops will prevent the gruit from going sour, without adding too much bitterness. I've done gruits both with and without hops, and without then the gruit usually turns out tart. Hops have remarkable anti-tartness properties.

 

[TasunkaWitko]

Good information - thanks!

It also would explain the tartness of the gruit I made; it worked well in that particular gruit (it was a lemon/dandelion gruit), but for another type of gruit, maybe not.

 

[Albionwood]

No!! Recipe looked great, except I would ease off on the mugwort, because it is very strong. I have used it many times in the past. I would cut back to maybe just 1/4 oz mugwort -- less is more. Hope it's not too late.

Uh-oh. I used an ounce... It was not very high-quality or fresh, though, so maybe it won't overwhelm. Quite a lovely aroma!

 

[Albionwood]

It looks great - I wouldn't mind trying that at all ~

My only suggestion, possibly for the future, would be to use or add dandelion leaves. I'd advise the use of these instead of the hops, which traditionally weren't used in gruits. I'm not sure if that is important or not, but just an FYI.

The recipe that I have for Dandelion Gruit says to use 7 leaves for a gallon of gruit. If you decide to try them, that might be a good starting point.

Thanks. Dandelions are all finished here - no leaves left - otherwise I might have tried that. This one is not intended to be strictly authentic to the medieval style; I want it to be approachable for a general audience.

 

[Albionwood]

So this beer came out very interesting. It did not ferment well; OG was 1.052 and it finished at 1.020. It also stayed very murky, even after long chilling; kind of looked like brown mud, actually. Initially the mugwort flavor dominated, but the chamomile was also there; later the mugwort mintiness faded and the herbal character became quite pleasantly balanced with earthiness from the dandelion root. Some people really liked it, but most agreed it was too sweet.

I gave it plenty of time and tried a lot of tricks to get the yeast going again; nothing happened. A friend of mine cultured up a local wild yeast collected from fruit trees - he's kind of a yeast genius - so I pitched that in and let it sit for a few weeks. Gravity dropped to 1.012 and it developed a little tartness; the herbal character changed, but is still present. It's a totally different drink now, and whether it's better or not depends on whether you like tart/sour beers. I am not really that big on sours, but I think this is a better drink than when it was too sweet.

I would try this again, but with a 100% Brettanomyces fermentation right from the start, and tinker with the herbal quantities. Also I might try it with fresh dandelion in addition to the root; and if I can get fresh heather tips, I will definitely use those in lieu of dried, which have little character.

 

[Albionwood]

Well, I had a few bottles of this left, so we cracked one yesterday. Holy cow! This has turned into something really good. Mostly because of the wild yeast, which turned the beer into something kind of like Rodenbach, with that intense fruity sour aroma, and the gruit character is now a background note instead of intruding on the profile. It also cleared up and is now a nice dark reddish-brown.

I'm beginning to think gruit sours are my new infatuation. I got a bunch more Buckwheat malt and will be trying this again.

 

[Miraculix]

Its easy to make a sour gruit... all you need to do is basically add no hops, then the gruit will sour by itself

...all my gruits turned into sours, some of them better ones, some of them "only ok" ones.

 

[Albionwood]

Its easy to make a sour gruit... all you need to do is basically add no hops, then the gruit will sour by itself

...all my gruits turned into sours, some of them better ones, some of them "only ok" ones.

I think we've discussed this before... your experience is based on your methods, which do not include rigorous sanitation procedures.

It is entirely possible to make a gruit that never goes sour. This one, for example, spent several months in the keg - and was transferred from one keg to another - and never went even slightly tart until we introduced the wild culture.

Control the process, control the outcome. Or not - if you like surprises!

 

[Miraculix]

Surely it is possible, but is easier to make a sour gruit. I do not know if it was the sanitation or the fact that it was mid summer and hot, possibly both did contribute. Will brew one in January again, let's see how that one will turn out!

Gruits are much harder to control than hopped beers, so there is always the chance that the beer will sour over time... but probably not every single one.

 

[dmtaylor]

Homebrewers can only sanitize, not sterilize. There's always a few wild critters in any homebrew. Given enough time, most gruits will sour. Hops became wildly popular a few hundred years ago NOT because people loved the bitterness and hoppy flavors, but because of their PRESERVATIVE QUALITIES that prevented or delayed souring. That's a fact.

 

[Albionwood]

Hops became wildly popular a few hundred years ago NOT because people loved the bitterness and hoppy flavors, but because of their PRESERVATIVE QUALITIES that prevented or delayed souring. That's a fact.

Yes - especially because it was quickly discovered that BOILING wort with hops gave the resulting beer extended storage quality, thus enabling export. It's still an open question, AFAIK, whether medieval gruit ales were routinely boiled or not.

Regardless, it is also factual that a modern homebrewer has much greater understanding and control of sanitation than any historical brewer. We can certainly create unhopped beers that store for months without souring, if we so choose.

 

[dmtaylor]

We can certainly create unhopped beers that store for months without souring, if we so choose.

Certainly. Just add about 8 IBUs worth of hops to the boil. I've done it. It works well. And at that low level you won't be able to detect any hop character.