2 New Recipes - Looking for Opinons

Beer Recipes
1

Fellow Brewers,

I have an event coming up in July I am trying to make some beer for. I modified a couple of recipes to work with the inventory of my LHBS and the leftover stock in my freezer. One is a Saison and the other is a Wheat Beer (inspired by the dogfish head wildflower wheat). Looking for any advice or confirmation that I have these pretty well prepared.

Equipment: 10 Gal BIAB Mash/Kettle

Summer Saison

OG: 1.071 FG: 1.012
IBU: 29.1 Color: 5.8 SRM

12 lbs Pilsner (Bel) (80.7%)
0.75 lbs Wheat (Bel) (5.0%)
1 lbs Munich (6.7%)
0.13 lbs Caramunich (0.8%)
1 lbs Cane Sugar (6.7%)

1.75 oz EKG (60 min)
1 Whirlfloc (15 min)
0.75 oz Styrian Goldings (5 min)
0.25 oz EKG (Dry Hop 5 days)
0.25 oz Styrian Goldings (Dry Hop 5 days)

White Labs Belgian Saison I Ale (WLP565) (3 packs or a big starter, targeting 360-450 million cells)

Single Infusion Mash 145F-150F for 60 minutes
60 minute boil
Pitch between 75-80F
Primary 5-10 days (have dry champagne yeast in case of attenuation issues.)
Secondary 14 days (Dry hop last 5)
Carb to 3.2-3.5 vol

Wildflower Wheat
OG: 1.052 FG: 1.009
IBU: 21.9 Color: 3.7 SRM

4.5 lbs Pale 2-Row (US) (42.9%)
4.5 lbs Wheat (Briess) (42.9%)
1.5 lbs Wildflower Honey (14.3%)

1.00 oz Willamette (60 min)
1.00 oz Chamomile (dry) (60 min)
0.25 oz Mt Hood (15 min)

White Labs American Hefeweizen Ale (WLP320) (2 packs or a big starter, targeting 206-268 million cells)

Single Infusion Mash 150F-153F for 60 minutes
60 minute boil
Pitch between 75-80F
Primary 5-10 days
Secondary 14 days
Carb to 2.6 vol

I am new to both of these styles. Are there any particular nuances about either the Saisons or the Wheat Beers? Any suggestions on multiple packs of yeast vs starters? Would Secondary even be necessary on the Wildflower Wheat?

Let me know what you think about these two, I am pretty excited to get this brewing season off to a great start.

2

In my experience, the saison will finish below 1.012. My usually end up around 1.005 or below when I use saison yeast.

YMMV.

3

Especially with the sugar.

To the OP, FG estimates are just a wild guess.  Don’t take them too literally.

4

Agreed with the above - a low OG is desirable here. I like to finish around 1.004-1.002 for that super dry, light saison character. Personally, I would drop the caramunich, though I see you aren’t using much. Just personal preference.

5

My past experience would back that up as well. Those are just the beersmith generated numbers. Thanks for the replies!

6

I took your advice and ditched the caramunich. It was lingering from the previous recipe.

What OG would you consider targeting to get that low and dry finish? 1.050-1.060?

7

I usually target ~ 1.055, give or take 4 or 5 points. WY3711 is a voracious eater, and if given plenty of time to hit FG, will eat down to 1.002 pretty often, even slightly lower. A long, low mash (148-149F/90 minutes) helps give you a highly fermentable wort and high attenuation.

8

Noted. Thanks for the info! I will be keeping the mash low for longer as you suggested. Ill have to play around with the grain bill to lower the gravity some. Would you cut the sugar or the base malts?

9

If you mash like above, you shouldn’t have to change your grist (provided you don’t use too many unfermentable/low fermentable malts like crystal). And that small amount of caramunich would be ok in terms of attenuation - I just like them dry like the classic examples. Go with what you want. Here’s the thing with a yeast like 3711 and sugar - you can keep it or lose it. 3711 has a surprising amount of  mouthfeel even on a 1.002 FG beer, so if you keep it, you’ll have a nice dry example. Drop the sugar and it’ll still attenuate really well but you’ll have a surprisingly nice mouthfeel. Good either way. FWIW, I like to give saison around 3 weeks in primary because the yeast will continue to eat the last few points really slowly. Good luck.