Wedding Wheats

A couple of weeks ago, my friend and my brother's roommate, Matt Jones, stopped by and had a proposition.  Matt is like a second little brother to me.  He was my brother's friend in elementary school, and joined cub scouts with him.  We went through Boy Scouts Together, and we both have our Eagle rank.  We've been to many mountain tops, on numerous hiking treks, and we've even shared a few homebrews over the years.

Me (front), Matt (middle), and My Brother (Back) sitting on a boulder half way up Mt. Harvard in Buena Vista, Colo.

Just like every homebrewer in history, I now have the chance to make his "signature" brew for his wedding coming up here over labor day weekend.  It's also a great distraction while I am waiting for the new progeny, my first son, to arrive.  We all know my passion is in IPAs, sweet hop nectar.  But Matt requested something light and summery, again, it's labor day weekend.  So I will make an IPA, because why not?  But I will also make a few different wheat beers and see which Matt will choose.

When crafting a wheat I like a good amount of wheat in my grain bill, over 55%, if it's any less, I am just trying to increase the head retention.  The wheat bill contributes very little to the overall flavor of the beer, but increases the silky, smooth mouthfeel.  This makes it an excellent choice when looking for something to casually sip on all night at, let's say, a wedding reception.

I decided to make three wheat beers and let Matt choose his favorite, the other two i will, sadly, have to consume myself.

My first Wheat will be a Hefeweizen.  Simple grain bill, mellow hop, and bold yeast flavor.  This traditional wheat beer is where it all started, and where I'm starting.  The wheat and barley will give it a subtle malty character with that refreshing smooth mouthfeel.  The Nobel Hop, Tettnang, will balance the sweetness with a little bite, and finally the yeast.  It will impart banana and clove notes, but keep the beer balanced and refreshing.  I love Hefes and I really look forward to this one finishing.

Too bad you can't grow these in a garden

Recipe:
5 lbs. White Wheat
4 lbs. 2-Row Barley
1/2 lbs. Carapils

1 oz Tattnang 60 minutes
White Labs Hefeweizen WLP300


Single Infusion Mash at 152 F
60 Minute Boil
Chill and pitch yeast

Small Boilover, nothing I can't handle... Need a bigger kettle

I thought about doing a protein rest at 122 F for 12 minutes, but decided against it.  I figured I would boil most of the proteins out, and hopefully the Irish Moss and a good secondary fermentation will clarify the beer as much as I need it to.  If I still have some protein cloudiness, I will add some gelatin filings.

I had a great conversion efficiency and my Original Gravity is 1.052, so this should be very drinkable at about   5-5.5% alcohol by volume.  All I can do is wait...

Hochzeit im Sommer Hefeweizen

Update: 7/23/13
I had a glass of the Hochzeit Hefeweizen last night and it was fantastic.  Rebekah, Wilder, Izzy, and I had just come home from a walk.  The cicadas were buzzing their twilight song and the warm, sunset light was slowing fading to night.  We sat on the front porch and I listened to Rebekah sing to Wilder while I sipped on a cold hefeweizen.

The aroma is very nice, malty, with some clove.  The initial flavor is very clean.  Banana and clove finish with a sweetness lingering until the next sip.  As with all wheats, the head lasted thought the entire glass and left a nice lace.  The mouth feel is full, but not thick, very sipable, with a nice carbonation bite.  Great beer for Sommer!

Copper Ale

I first made this ale back when I was a green brewer; however, when I tasted it, it made me feel like I had this "brewing thing" licked.  It was roasty, but not in a brown sort of way.  It was hoppy, but not in an ipa sort of way.  I was malty, but not too sweet.  I was a down the road, middle lane, complex sort of beer.  I could have brewed 50 gallons, and I'd love every taste.  So with all that in mind, I had to make it again.

I ran across the recipe on accident.  I got Midwest's "Bourbon Barrel Ale" recipe from my aunt and uncle for Christmas in 2006.  I but the oak cubes in some bourbon, but I couldn't wait for the beer to mature on them so I never added the cubes.  Instead I just racked the beer to a keg, carbonated, and enjoyed.  I have since modified the recipe and I think it's a little better.

13 lbs. 2-Row
1 lb. Biscuit malt
8 oz Brown malt
8 oz Crystal 60L
8 oz Wheat
4 oz Belgian Aromatic
2 oz Chocolate malt

1 oz Liberty 60 minutes
2 oz Williamette 30 minutes
1oz Fuggles 15 minutes
1oz Williamette 15 mintues

1968 London Ale Yeast

Bad Tastes...

I've been running into a few issues with an off flavor in my beer.  It has a terrible medicine taste and is really astringent.  Almost like a box of band aids.  This has been the downfall of many of my past few brews.  Last year I made an Oktoberfest that had this flavor.  My last two Pilsners have had this flavor and I brewed a copper ale that I am going to have to throw out as well.  Needless to say, throwing away beer makes me a sad homebrewer.

I believe this flavor is coming from the chlorine in my water.  With every beer I make I have used some amount of tap water.  I typically boil the water and add metabisulfite to break up the chloramine as well.  I thought this was getting rid of any chlorine, but I think I'm wrong.

I have been focusing on the water chemistry of my mash water and using Reverse Osmosis water with CaSO4 (gypsum)  and CaCL2 (Calcium Chloride).   I've been trying to his a 5.50 PH on my mash.  I will then use tap water or a combination of RO and tap to sparge my grains.  This is probably where the chlorine is introduced.

There maybe a few more factors going into is such as fermentation temperature or even the crush of my grains, but I'm sure it has to be the chlorine in the water.

Today I am going to make an Oktoberfest, I know it's really late in the year, and use only RO with treatment.  This should give me a chance to see if it is chlorine or if it is a different issues in my brewing process.  I want to eventually filter all my brew water, but this is be best way to insure I have no chlorine in my water.  Wish me luck.

Citra IPA

Who doesn't love a great India Pale Ale.  It's hoppy, sweet, malty, light in color, you can drink them all day long.  And those amazing little hop cones giving it flavors of citrus, spice, pepper, grass, bubble gum, and grapefruit.  One of the issues of the IPA is the bitterness that can become overwhelming.  Since so many hops are utilized, the beer can become bitter and that can ruin all of the other great flavors.  In my other IPA I remedy this by using Nugget hops which have a great smooth mellow bitterness.  This time around I decided to use no bittering hop, but instead add a bunch of hops at the end of the boil to give it a nice flavor, aroma, and slight bitterness.

I used a fairly traditional grain bill:

11 lbs. 2-row Barley
1 lb. Munich Malt
8oz Crystal 20L
1 lb. Carafoam
(now the fun part)
1oz. Citra 20 minutes
1oz. Citra 15 minutes
1.5oz. Citra 10 mintues
.75oz Citra 5 mintues
.75oz Citra 1 minute
3oz Citra Dry Hop

I had a great brew day and I used my propane burner for the first time a while.  And my gravity is at 1.071 so it should be a nice warming beer.  It's had a fantastic smell coming through the bubbler on the fermenter for the past two weeks as well.  I took the thief and got a sample last night and it has the amazing orange flavor with some other citrus and a good alcohol balance.  It's going to be amazing cold, I just need to get another keg empty...

Weed Puller Rye Saison

It's funny how someone can get so far into home brewing and not pay much attention to the most important ingredient.  When you think about Coors, you think about cold Rocky mountian water.  When you think about Hamms, you think about the "land of sky blue" waters.  And yet, I've overlooked the water profile of the water I've been using out of my own tap.  Beer is really just water with a few other amazing things in it.  Brewers use water to convert starches to sugars, rinse the sugars from the grain, isomerize hop acids, coagulate unwanted proteins, the list goes on.  Therefore, it is, arguably, the most important ingredient in beer.


Lincoln, Nebraska has hard water coming out of the tap.  Hard water is good for beer, there are lots of great salts and metals that aid in making good sugars and complex beers.  But when it comes to making something light and easy to drink, sometimes these salts and create off tastes.  Plus bigger cities add chlorine and chloramine in the water and that can give beer a medicinal flavor.  Here is Lincoln's Profile:


Magnesium is about 16ppm
HCO3- is 246.44ppm (alkalinity)
CACo3 is 181ppm


When I'm brewing I add a little Sodium Metabisufite (or a Camden tablet) to eliminate the Chloramine from the water.  Chlorine will eventually evaporate out of the water if you let it sit.  I've never had an issue from there until I try to brew something very light.  I get an off taste, almost medicinal and very off putting.  It ruins the light maltiness and hop of a pilsner or pale ale.  This profile is great for a stout or a porter, but not something light.  I decided to start really paying attention to what style I was brewing and my water profile.  So with this brew, a saison, I decided to go with a 50% Lincoln water, 50% Reverse Osmosis from HyVee.

I am using Rye malt in this beer to add some dryness, a little spiciness, and some peppery notes.  I used pilsner malt to lend some European taste to the body as well.  I am using a Styrian Goldings hop to give it some northern European/Austrian flavor.  I used 1.5 oz for 60 minutes to bitter up the beer and 1 oz to give it some flavor at 10 minutes.  I'm really excited to see how this ones turns out.  My Original Gravity is 1.059 and the ABV should be around 6.5%, a perfect summer beer after mowing the lawn or pulling weeds in the garden.

Hopfenweisen or India Wheat Ale (IWA)

This beer is more of an experiment.  I was curious what my ultimate two "spring" beer styles would be like together, wheat and ipa.  Wheat beers are traditionally very mild.  They are very smooth and have a good mouth feel.  They stand alone, don't need any caramel malt or strong hops, they are very relaxing and just remind me of a cool spring day.

On the other hand, ipa's have a strong hop character that reminds me of all the little green things starting to wake up again and stretch their little heads from the cold wet soil.  The pronounced citrus and candy resin flavors give it a "waking up" taste.  That's why I felt these two styles could be suited to be paired.  A mild wheat back ground and a bright hop flavor.

I decided to stick with one kind of hop and use Amarillo.  It is a good all-around hop.  It has nice floral, citrus, spice, and orange like aroma and flavor and it's a good bittering hop because of it's low cohumulone content.  I also like a mainly wheat grist in my wheat beers so I stuck with a 50/50 wheat to barley mix.

6 lbs. Wheat Malt

5 lbs. 2 Row

1 lb. Caramalt

.25 oz Amarillo Mash Hop

.25 oz Amarillo 60 mins

.5 oz Amarillo 15 mins

1.25 Amarillo 5 mins

1 oz Amarillo 1 mins

2 oz Amarillo Dry Hop 7 Days

Safebrew 33 Dry Yeast

I've never really understood the purpose of a mash hop so I looked it up.  First Word Hopping is said to impart he same bitterness as a 20-minute addition and retain the essential oils that impart flavor and aroma.  This works because alpha acids and compounds that would normally boil off during the 60 minute boil are isomerized and stay with the wort for the most part throughout the boil.  The mash did have a great hop aroma from the very beginning.

Tin Pail Ale

I began transporting my beer in empty 12 oz bottles when I first started homebrewing.  This was very time consuming to do and I was always washing so many bottles.  I then tried using empty wine bottles, this was a little easier, but I was afraid the pressure from the carbonation would push out the cork.  I then discovered half gallon growlers and I'm never going to look back!

I have been transporting my beer recently and I decided to do a little research on the history of the growler.  Turns out at the turn of century, local breweries would sell their brew for a nickel or a dime to fill up a 2 quart tin pail.  Since refrigeration wasn't in every home, this made it much easier to drink cold beer.

In honor of this tradition, I decided to brew my next beer in honor of this pre-prohibition tradition.  I formulated a recipe using a good deal of flavor, aroma, and dry hops.  Also adding just a bit of chocolate malt to give it some rusty color.

9 lbs. 2-Row

1 lb Crystal 80L

2 oz Chocolate Malt

.5 oz Cascade 60 mins

.5 oz Centennial 15 mins

.5 Cascade 10 mins

1 oz Centennial 5 mins

1 oz Citra 5 mins

1 oz Citra 7 days dry hop

I mashed in at around 150 degrees and let it sit for an hour.  Boiled as usual and I used a dry yeast Safebrew 33.  I has a sharp bitterness at first taste and I wonder if this is because not all of the chlorine evaporated out of my mash water.  I am letting it sit a little longer to see if it mellows out.  It does have a nice grapefruit character and a good amount of maltyness.