I am planning on Brewing a Wit next week while ignoring my mother in law enjoying some down time. I have done my homework and have come up with the following plan.
1. I will use the recipe by Jamil Zainasheff published in BYO magazine. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://byo.com/stories/item/1647-witbier-style-profile">https://byo.com/stories/item/1647-witbier-style-profile</a><!-- m -->.
2. I will skip the spice profile he laid out and defer to Rob Tod from Allagash in his recipe in Sam Calagione's Extreme Brewing. He calls for .25 oz of Coriander, .25 oz of orange, and a pinch of secret spice. That secret spice is going to be grains of paradise. I don’t want to brew a "coriander soup", as Hieronymus calls it. I am also going to follow his lead in using Tettnanger and Saaz for bittering and Saaz for aroma.
3. Brewing with Wheat by Stan Hieronymus is a wonderful source of information. Based on the details from the book, I plan on adding the following levels of complexity.
a. I will use a turbid mash schedule. <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="https://byo.com/stories/item/1711-turbid-mashing">https://byo.com/stories/item/1711-turbid-mashing</a><!-- m -->
b. I will reserve about 1 quart of pasteurized, unboiled wort for fermentation from the turbid mash. I hope that this will help sour the beer just slightly though lactobacillus infection. (or it can completely screw me over)
c. I plan on adding a small amount of chamomile (.25 oz?) to the fermenter a couple of days before bottling.
4. Finally, I am considering a "petit biere de blanche" with the second runnings. I will add 1-2 lbs of fresh pils malt to the mash tun and hope to pull out 3-4 gallons of 1.025-1.030 wort. I will ferment this with French Saison yeast and dry hop it with some Saaz.
Thoughts, opinions, insults, and rude thoughts are welcome.
Dan
