So, since Fall will be here before we know it, I've been concocting a recipe for a small batch of wheatwine that I can hopefully be drinking by the time the holidays roll around. This is my first attempt at the style, so let me know if there's anything that looks off, or anything that you'd do differently. Wheatwine Batch Size - 2.75-3 gal Anticipated O.G. - 1.130 Anticipated F.G. - 1.037 Anticipate ABV - 12.6% ~ 60 IBUs Yeast WLP005 British Ale Yeast - 1.5 liter starter built up twice, 1 week before pitching. No stir plate, just occasional agitation. WLP002 English Ale Yeast (slurry from recent yeast cake) - 1 liter starter. No stir plate, just occasional agitation. Same day as doing starter, soak 2 oz american oak cubes in 4-5 oz whiskey. Grain/other 3.5 lbs. two-row pale malt 8 lbs. wheat malt 1 lb rice hulls 1 lb honey Mash 152 ºF for 80 min Mashout at 165 ºF Sparge at 170 ºF for 10 min 90 min boil 0.75 oz. (12% AA) Galena hops at 60 min 0.5 oz. (6% AA) Cascade hops at 15 min 1 tsp yeast nutrient at 15 min 0.25 oz. (6% AA) Cascade hops at 5 min 1 lb honey at 5 min Splash between 2 fermenters to aerate. Co-pitch English and British ale starters. Hook up aeration stone and aerate well. Ferment at 65-70 ºF. Let sit in primary for at least 1 month before bottling. At bottling, add tincture of oak soaked bourbon to bottling bucket. Prime with brown sugar. Thoughts? TIA!
Big beers scare me. I'd certainly aerate again 12 to 18 hours after pitching to encourage cell growth/health. I'd also consider raising IBUs for balance. The high alcohol will help balance that FG but will probably get too sweet/chewy very quickly. The final gravity would probably benefit from being a little lower. Even 1.030 range is fairly high. I'd honestly shoot a little lower for FG, you'll have trouble attenuating as it is especially with an English yeast. Possibly pitch a more attenuating yeast at around day 4 or 5 to lower the FG. Good luck and cheers!
Thanks man. I'll definitely do some research before I brew this. The biggest beer I did came in around 14% after multiple sugar additions, but I also finished it off with the super high gravity strain. @stealth I know you've brewed some insanely high gravity beers before (noticed from the posts). Anything you'd do differently here, or any tips on fermenting down these monsters? Other than using a metric ass ton of yeast, that is ~13% is nothing compared to that NMB beer you brewed!
Brewing a bigger brew like this, it just comes down to using the right yeast to do the job, pitching the right amount of yeast, using oxygen, and yeast nutrients. You got the latter two covered so you just need to make sure you have the yeast to do the job. I've never had to re-aerate after my initial aeration when doing beers this size before. WLP002/5 have a stated tolerance of 10%, so you are going to need to keep the yeast super happy to ferment that beer out completely. That being said, I used Wyeast 1098 to ferment a wheatwine I did and I hit 14% before I used the WLP099 to finish it out to 18%+. It has a tolerance of 10% as well. 002/5 flocculate heavily so stirring up the yeast cake after a couple days may help if you notice things stalling out. I use the yeast pitch rate calculator at http://www.brewersfriend.com/yeast-pitch-rate-and-starter-calculator/ With a setting of Pro Brewer 1.25 (I usually use 1.5+ though), the WLP005 volume you will be pitching will not be enough to ferment the beer down from 1.130 so you will be relying on whatever your cell count is in your yeast cake. I don't like to rely on guesswork, but if it's a healthy yeast cake with a good amount of yeast you may be OK. I don't like the 'may be' part. I'd keep another vial of yeast on hand just in case, and be ready to whip up a starter to re-pitch if it doesn't attenuate fully. Maybe consider a strain that is a bit more tolerant, to be safe if you cannot create a bigger starter with a higher cell count. A stirplate would get you there, and you can make em for less than $20. Also, echoing what GBL said, I'd aim for 1.025-1.03 for a FG. I like to have my big brews finish there when I want to have a nice chewy mouthfeel. The IBUs on my wheatwine were 60 as well. My wheatwine was meant to be pretty sweet though (I named it Beer Candy, afterall), so take that for what it's worth.
Thanks for the advice. I may have to re-consider the yeast, but yea I use that Brewers friend calculator a lot and it's awesome! - very helpful. I've got quite a few small mason jars of the WLP002 on hand, so I may use double the amount in the one starter. I think in this scenario it's better to over-pitch than under pitch. Whatever I end up doing (and whenever I end up doing it), I'll let you know how it goes. Thanks again!
All looks pretty good to me, but as said before make sure you have a large enough pitch and I'd stay on the colder side of fermentation to watch out for that D
