Beer and Brewing Journal

Ingredients don't get much simpler than this: Wheat dry malt extract and Cascade hops.

Last Sunday I brewed a batch of American Wheat ala JZ’s recipe. In this, Jamil mentions a couple points that I stuck with:

• Resist the temptation to add specialty grains…go with just base barley and wheat.


• Use a Kölsch yeast strain for a crisper, more stand out beer.
  

It was a pretty standard brew day. I propagated up a 1 liter starter of the Kölsch yeast the night before and boiled up the ingredients the next day. I pretty much hit my numbers all the way through….I was targeting a post-boil gravity of 1.052 and according to my refractometer I was spot on. When I took the final hydrometer reading later in the day, it was showing 1.058. I swear the wort was cool enough when I did the refracto reading but I guess this is something I need to note and adjust for in future brews.

The boil (above) and the almost extinct Cascade hops (below), the bigger dose for bittering at the beginning of the boil and the smaller dose for aroma at end of boil. I calculated the bittering units to about 22 IBU for this batch.