Wheat beer experiment, need feedback.

[Incongruent]

Repost as I think I had added to wrong forum section last time...

I've been reading up on everything since I started this hobby a couple of months ago. This is the first forum post ive made as I think ive reached a level of comfort where I can ask for some feedback. Can you guys please review my questions below based on this recipe I am trying?

My setup:
-lbk primary
-no secondary

My recipe:
-300g wheat lme
-120g pale lme
-100g cocoa powder
-250g glucose
-1/2 can coopers wheat beer can
-3.75g dry yeast came with kit
-20g French roast beans whole, soaked in vodka
-1tbsp vanilla extract

What I've done:

1) boiled wheat and pale LME and cocoa and glucose for 10 mins.
2) Added coopers wheat can and removed from heat to ice bath (reached 40•C)
3) Added 7L cold charcoal filtered water to lbk
4) Added ice bathed wort to lbk
5) mixed into the keg together OG measured at 1.044
6) 26•C pitched yeast.


My questions:
A) did I overdo the cocoa? I read some recipe used 200g per 5 gallon batch and some used 2tbsp. The wort reminded me of hot chocolate... it was heavy... but the hygrometer sample tasted like chocolate and wort.
B) when should I add the coffee beans/vodka? Today? 4d from now when fermentation slowing down? Just before bottling?
C) when should I add vanilla extract?
D) I plan to add 70g of dextrose to prime before bottling. Sound good? The kit called for 50g per 3gallon batch but ive strayed from the kit a good deal.
E) dry hopping has improved every beer Ive made. Should I dry hop this? What hop will work? I have hallertau handy.
F) any comments on what I've done here? Good? Bad?
G) any predictions for how this thing is gonna turn out?
H) Any suggestions for what you'd do differently?


I'm still on the lbk because 2.5 gallon batches suits my consumption rate right now and I'm happy with the simplicity of this fermenter.

 

[ncbrewer]

I can't help with the cocoa, vanilla, and beans because I haven't used them. But since German hefeweizen is so different from American wheat beer, it would probably help if you say which type of yeast you used.

 

[Incongruent]

The kit doesn't specify. But Internet posts suggest it is a American wheat.

 

[55x11]

Repost as I think I had added to wrong forum section last time...

I've been reading up on everything since I started this hobby a couple of months ago. This is the first forum post ive made as I think ive reached a level of comfort where I can ask for some feedback. Can you guys please review my questions below based on this recipe I am trying?

My setup:
-lbk primary
-no secondary

My recipe:
-300g wheat lme
-120g pale lme
-100g cocoa powder
-250g glucose
-1/2 can coopers wheat beer can
-3.75g dry yeast came with kit
-20g French roast beans whole, soaked in vodka
-1tbsp vanilla extract

What I've done:

1) boiled wheat and pale LME and cocoa and glucose for 10 mins.
2) Added coopers wheat can and removed from heat to ice bath (reached 40•C)
3) Added 7L cold charcoal filtered water to lbk
4) Added ice bathed wort to lbk
5) mixed into the keg together OG measured at 1.044
6) 26•C pitched yeast.


My questions:
A) did I overdo the cocoa? I read some recipe used 200g per 5 gallon batch and some used 2tbsp. The wort reminded me of hot chocolate... it was heavy... but the hygrometer sample tasted like chocolate and wort.
B) when should I add the coffee beans/vodka? Today? 4d from now when fermentation slowing down? Just before bottling?
C) when should I add vanilla extract?
D) I plan to add 70g of dextrose to prime before bottling. Sound good? The kit called for 50g per 3gallon batch but ive strayed from the kit a good deal.
E) dry hopping has improved every beer Ive made. Should I dry hop this? What hop will work? I have hallertau handy.
F) any comments on what I've done here? Good? Bad?
G) any predictions for how this thing is gonna turn out?
H) Any suggestions for what you'd do differently?


I'm still on the lbk because 2.5 gallon batches suits my consumption rate right now and I'm happy with the simplicity of this fermenter.

you pitched at 26 degC? thats 78F, too warm! (especially if fermentation takes off).

To me, the wheat beers (hefeweizens, weizenbocks, dunkelweizens etc.) are all about wheat (bready smell/smooth taste) and yeast producing esters (banana, etc.).

Cocoa, coffee, vanilla - to me those don't mash well with wheat beers. It works well with fruit, especially when done with clean american wheat style - or coriander and orange peel like in belgian wit style. But Cocoa, coffee and vanilla are more for stouts and porters, not wheat beers. But what do I know? Try it, tell us how it went.

Finally, I think it's too many different things. Even in a stout/porter, I would try one or two clean notes. By now you have wheat which gives you some flavor, possible banana esters, and now you are adding all these other flavors - thats just way too much in my book.

 

[Incongruent]

You might be right in flavor overload. I'll reconsider adding the coffee and maybe just add to 1/4 the bottles and maybe skip the vanilla altogether. I had wanted to try something I've never been able to buy before at the risk of it not being that good so hope it turns out okay. The upper range of the allowable temps according to the kit is 26•C (maybr its here yeast afterall?). It was down to 24•C the next day.

 

[Calaeb]

Do you plan to stick with the coopers kits or move on to other styled kits? One of the things I would recommend is getting some actual yeast that you know what it is,

 

[Incongruent]

I've got one more coopers stout can to use, then I'm taking off the training wheels and will try recipes from scratch. I just like the kits while I'm learning to reduce the points of failure but I think I have the process down well and can add those extra steps in the process now.

 

[Chanoc]

If you overdid the chocolate would depend on what you were trying to achieve. 100gr in 2.5 gallons seems ok in a mesd, so I think should be in your wheat.
I would do vanilla and cofee after primary fermentation subsides in order not to loose too much aroma or if you want to carry the experiment a little bit further, as a tincture at bottling time, you know, some bottles with vanilla, some with cofee, some with both.
70 gr dextrose seems a little high to me, I just bottled an WEB that called for 85 gr for 4 gals.
You can check any of the online priming sugar calculators...
Sorry I can't help you with the dry hopping, but I think any noble hops are ok...
Good or bad, you'll be the judge... worst case scenario, you'll learn what works and what not...
Let us know what you did and how it went.

 

[ericbw]

It sounds like you'll end up with a porter style. It wont be roasty though.

I think you should add coffee and vanilla after it finishes (2 weeks) and let it sit for 2 more weeks.

Calculate your bottling sugar to get about 2 volumes. Do you know what I mean?

That's a lot if cocoa, but it could still turn out interesting.

I don't know about coopers - do they just use one yeast for all the can kits?

Dry hopping covers a multitude of sins. It doesn't fix it but it covers it.

 

[Incongruent]

Day 4 in fermenter. I don't usually like to pop the cover and look before it's time... but thos bubbles are looking gnarly. Do I have a problem?

http://m.imgur.com/gallery/DqtGUui

 

[dilligafbrewing]

Am I the only one that thinks this recipe is way under-hopped?

 

[GilSwillBasementBrews]

Day 4 in fermenter. I don't usually like to pop the cover and look before it's time... but thos bubbles are looking gnarly. Do I have a problem?

http://m.imgur.com/gallery/DqtGUui

Looks ok to me. Just looks like a chocolatey krausen.

 

[Incongruent]

Am I the only one that thinks this recipe is way under-hopped?

What hop do you think would work? I like the idea of dry hopping but I think there's a lot of flavors happening already.

 

[dilligafbrewing]

Seems like there should have been some bittering hops to balance the pound of fermentables that were added to what I assume was a can of hopped malt syrup, and I would have done a longer boil....unless you're trying to make something very sweet.

 

[Incongruent]

Seems like there should have been some bittering hops to balance the pound of fermentables that were added to what I assume was a can of hopped malt syrup, and I would have done a longer boil....unless you're trying to make something very sweet.

I was hoping for something kind of rich and dark but not necessarily sweet. I will live with something that is at minimum drinkable and not tasting like chocolate gym socks.


The can is actually no boil and calls for dry pale malt but I substituted for liquid and added more wheat than pale. I boiled because I wasn't sure about the need to kill any bacteria in the liquid malt and also to keep the cocoa sterile.

If the recipe ends up decent I'll keep working on it with my own ingredients rather than the can. So I'll probably bitter hop that at the appropriate time during the 60m boil. Saaz? Crystal? What's a good hop assuming I keep the rest of the flavour profile the same?

 

[GilSwillBasementBrews]

I'd think any of the noble hops would work to keep your flavor profile. Saaz is good or tettnang, hellertau....

 

[dilligafbrewing]

You should always boil dry extract a minimum of 15 minutes to get the hot break and coagulate the proteins out of the wort.

+1 for noble hops, hallertaur especially would be good. Good floral aroma without too much alpha acid

 

[Incongruent]

I took my second hydrometer reading... 1.018. I hope it is continuing to drop tomorrow but bubble activity is low. The sample tastes kind of good, but sweet. It tastes like a beerish watered down hot chocolate. It definitely needs the coffee to bitter it. I might only add vanilla to a few bottles to see the difference but I suspect it'll be not a welcome flavor.

The top layer is kind of white & filmy, but I read that's typical of wheat beer yeast. Not super worried yet as it tastes and smells fine.

 

[dilligafbrewing]

Carbonation will help to cut down the sweetness a bit. If the chocolate notes aren't already too strong I'd suggest cocoa nibs in the secondary to impart some bitterness if you still feel it's too sweet after another few days of the yeast cleaning up the ferment.

 

[Incongruent]

Added the coffee and vodka on Friday night and agitated the fermenter a bit to mix it. The coffee flavor really evens out that chocolate taste.

Bottled this evening with about 65ml of boiled dextrose. It was about 6 days in the fermenter. I know longer if better, but I can't wait any longer. I'm too impatient to know how it turns out.

I am looking forward to the carbed up finished product. Two 12oz bottles got about 2ml each of vanilla extract, but I forgot to label them so I'll have to guess which ones got it if I can. If I can't tell then it had no effect I suppose.


I should has muslin bagged the coffee. Some floaters ended up in the bottles.

The final gravity before I added coffee was about 1.014. So around 4%.

 

[dilligafbrewing]

Sounds like you've done almost everything wrong.

Patience and good process and practice are how you get good beer.

 

[Incongruent]

I've tried a couple bottles of these so far. I think it may improve with some time, but it's not great. As anticipated, the wheat and chocolate / coffee flavors are not melding well so far. It's drinkable, but not wonderful. Although I feel like if the recipe could be tweaked a bit, you would end up with something that might resemble the tim hortons iced capp coffee flavor, and that would be interesting. Anyway, probably won't do this again. There's a reason why it's not commercially available.