Hello!
We brewed this beer a couple months ago to enter into the Stone AHA Rally Homebrew Competition. We wanted to wait to post this recipe until after the competition. The inspiration for this beer came from spices used in traditional Vietnamese pho (here, we used coriander, cassia a.k.a. Saigon cinnamon, star anise, fennel, and fresh ginger). As both Belgian witbiers and pho broth can traditionally have coriander, I felt this would be an interesting twist to the wit style.
The spices turned out to be a bit overpowering, with fennel and anise dominating. Needless to say, it didn’t place. I’m going to rebrew the base witbier soon since I really liked how it was looking before the spice addition. This rebrew will retain the coriander, and I will likely also add some bitter orange peel. It’ll be fun to try the two versions side-by-side!
Vietnamese Wit (21A Spice/Herb/Vegetable beer, base style 16A Witbier)
Lead Brewer: Juli
Brew date: 2/1/2014
- Step Mash:
- 122°F for 20 minutes
- 156° for 60 minutes
- brought to 168° over ~20 minutes
- Sparged at 170°
- Final volume: 11 gallons
- OG: 1.056
- FG: 1.010
- ABV: 6.0%
- IBU: 13
Grain Bill:
- 9 lb (47.5%) German Pilsner
- 9 lb (47.5%) Flaked Wheat
- 1 lb (5%) Flaked Oats
- 2 lb Rice Hulls
Hop Schedule (90 minute boil):
- 60 minutes – 2.0 oz Saaz (4%AA, pellet)
- 4 day dry-hopped with 8 oz Cascade pellets and 1 oz cracked cassia
Miscellaneous:
- 1 tsp WLN1000 Yeast Nutrient, added to boil at 20 minutes
- 2 capsules Servomyces
- Spices, added to boil in a hop bag at 15 minutes, left in 20 minute whirlpool after flame out:
- 30 grams coriander, cracked
- 30 grams fennel, cracked
- 30 grams star anise, whole
- 30 grams cassia, whole
- 12.5 oz fresh ginger, peeled and sliced
Fermentation:
- White Labs WLP400 Belgian Wit Ale Yeast (2 vials, no starter), 90 seconds pure O2 prior to pitch
- Fermented at room temperature (68°F-72°F)
- Update 2/5/14: Roused the yeast
- Update 2/9/14: Gravity Check: 1.014, roused yeast again. It had a light sulfuric nose
Carbonation and bottling:
- 2/23/2014: Gravity check 1.010
Bitter Barley 