Witless ******* - Brew Day!

So, brew evening was upon us last eve. We aimed for the following recipe:

HOME BREW RECIPE:
Title: Witless *******
Author: David Evans

Brew Method: BIAB
Style Name: Witbier
Boil Time: 60 min
Batch Size: 10 liters (ending kettle volume)
Boil Size: 12 liters
Boil Gravity: 1.045
Efficiency: 70% (ending kettle)

STATS:
Original Gravity: 1.054
Final Gravity: 1.006
ABV (standard): 6.2%
IBU (tinseth): 24
SRM (morey): 3.64

FERMENTABLES:
0.5 kg - Flaked Wheat (20%)
1 kg - Belgian - Pilsner (40%)
1 kg - Belgian - Wheat (40%)

HOPS:
15 g - Hallertau Mittelfruh, Type: Pellet, AA: 3.75, Use: Boil for 60 min, IBU: 14.96
25 g - Hallertau Mittelfruh, Type: Pellet, AA: 3.75, Use: Boil for 10 min, IBU: 9.04
20 g - Amarillo, Type: Pellet, AA: 8.6, Use: Boil for 0 min
10 g - Simcoe, Type: Plug, AA: 12.7, Use: Dry Hop for 0 days

MASH GUIDELINES:
1) Fly Sparge, Temp: 66 C, Time: 60 min, Amount: 19 L

OTHER INGREDIENTS:
20 g - Coriander, Time: 10 min, Type: Spice, Use: Boil

YEAST:
Fermentis / Safale - Safbrew - Wheat Beer Yeast WB-06
Starter: No
Form: Dry
Attenuation (avg): 86%
Flocculation: Low
Optimum Temp: 12.22 - 25 C
Fermentation Temp: 20 C

Started heating around 12l of strike water to 71c at about 2000hrs. The brewing commenced. Today's tasks were to brew the above witbier and also bottle up our DIPAster brew.

DIPAster was an easy set up. I racked the primary FV into a secondary FV with a mix of brewers sugar (75.1g) and water (100ml) to give it enough sugar for priming. Cleaned the primary FV out in the bath as we would be using it later.

Paul bottled (mostly) and i capped. All in all we got 33 bottles of varying sizes made up.

Witless ******* was the next task. We laid out the ingredients and got to work. Mashed in the oats, pilsner and pale wheat at 66c for an hour (a bit of a fluctuating thermometer meant we ranged from 64 to 68 during this period). I kept my eye on the brew whilst Paul bottled. About halfway through I decided to chuck in a bit of maris otter just to give it a bit more 'oomph'. I'm a maverick, so sue me :-D

We sparged with water from off the boil, about 6l worth, to get the boil back up to about 12l.

After mash i took an OG reading of 1.022, so efficiency was a bit off. Hopefully the additional grains gave it a little bit of a kick in the teeth and the OG was off.

Removed the grains and then brought the kettle to the boil. Boil hit us about about 2135 and then we dumped the first lot of cracked coriander and Hallertau hops in. Went next door, drank some beer, watched some Archer on the telly.

Next thing we know we hear the lid boiling over. ****. We run through, shift the lid and let it cool down. Kept the rolling boil going and added the final glut of Hallertau at 10 minutes to go.

The cold crash: Added the Amarillo at knockout and whirlpool. Cooled the beast in an ice bath (pictures to follow) before bringing it back through. Temp reading on two thermometers was mixed (one said 31c, the other said 23c) so gave it five minutes before taking it back to the kitchen.

Racked it up and pumped it into the cleaned FV. Tipped the last little bit in. Pitched the yeast at 2335 and aerated the whole thing. Popped the lid on and shoogled it to aerate more. Popped into the garage.

Whole brewday complete in 3hrs 45mins.

More pics!

Looks sexy. Glad to hear that there's another Archer fan out there!

Nice pictures

Although you took an OG of 1022 at Mash temp?? normally you'd take the OG before you pitch yeast at least at a lower temp like 20-25 ish

Roughly I work out your OG at probably 1036 ish using an online calculator (assuming that is true) so about 45% efficiency

Again assuming the above is true I think you will end up about 3.5-4% abv

edit I wouldn't mind making a witbeir at some point so will be interested in how it turns out

Sorry, took a gravity reading at mash temp then one just before pitching - pitching one is the pic taken!

That looks like 1024-1026?? That cannot be right.. That would give you an efficiency of... 33%

and an expected ABV of 2.2%

The grain was crushed right?

did you try the wort from the trial jar to see what it tasted like..

Grains were definitely crush, we did try the wort - tasted very sweet.

You need to work out why your gravity reading is so low. Is it a reading error, or a mashing error?

I'm not feeling the name either. :p I'm gonna suggest Upper Class T'Wit. Monthly Python reference. See YouTube!

clibit said:

You need to work out why your gravity reading is so low. Is it a reading error, or a mashing error?

I'm not feeling the name either. :p I'm gonna suggest Upper Class T'Wit. Monthly Python reference. See YouTube!

Click to expand...

The two readings he gives is 1022 at post mash temp (not sure how accuratly you can convert that) online calculators suggest it could be 1030s and would you say the hydrometer in the pic says 1026?

A gravity reading taken above 50C is not worth relying on, I believe. When was the pic taken? Looks like 1028_1030, maybe, hard to tell. I'd stick the hydrometer in the FV I think, take another reading.

clibit said:

A gravity reading taken above 50C is not worth relying on, I believe. When was the pic taken? Looks like 1028_1030, maybe, hard to tell. I'd stick the hydrometer in the FV I think, take another reading.

Click to expand...

Will do when i get back to the castle. Cheers covrich, clibit this back and forth has been helpful.

Dropped the hydrometer in the FV, OG at 1.040-ish. The krausen is a funky green colour (possibly the late addition of amarillo? Who knows...)

Green stuff is hop debris. Your efficiency ain't great, need to suss out why really. Maybe you could explain your mash and sparge process?

1040 will still provide a good beer though. You could add some DME if you wanted to get up to 1050 ish.

It's not the best; I take the bag out and rinse the grains with water off the boil directly back into the kettle. All the while squeezing and kneading the bag

How much water fir the mash? How much for rinsing?

Used 12l for mash, about 6l for rinse.

Not sure what is happening then. You only got about 52% efficiency. Should be getting 65 or more. What was the mash temp at the start and end of the mash, and how long was the mash?

Mashed at 72 for strike, down to 66 for most of mash.

Try:

A mash out. Mash with 3 litres per kg of grain for an hour, then raise the temp to around 78C, stir well and transfer the wort into a coolbox or fv or something.

A batch sparge. Put the bag into the rest of the water, pre-heated to about 85C, in your brew pot. Stir well, leave 10 mins, then stir again, and remove bag. Allow to drain via colander over brew pot. Combine all the wort and boil

Also...
I note you are using the digital thermometers. My experience is they read high at low temps and low at high temps. Mine max out at just over 92 in boiling water.

If you haven't already you should check it against a glass thermo at key temperatures (66, 74, 80 etc.). It could explain your low efficiency.