American Dark Wheat

One of the nice surprises from my summer cross-country trips in recent years has been Thunderhead Brewing in Kearney, Nebraska. I went in the first time not expecting too much, but was very impressed with the beers. The one that made the biggest impact on me was their Cornstalker dark wheat beer: dark in color and a little chocolatey but with a light, easy drinking body. It's built a bit like a dunkelweizen, but with a clean American yeast and American hops. On a hot day, I could go through pint after pint of this stuff.

Though I really wanted to brew something in the Cornstalker vein to have around for the warmer months, this batch didn't make it out until late autumn. It's still pretty damn drinkable in colder weather, though more like a black blonde ale (if you will) than an American dunkelweizen. The Midnight wheat is actually too smooth; only giving off the slightest hint of roast, upon rebrew I'd sub out some of this grain for chocolate malt to achieve more coffee and chocolate notes. It also stayed on the dry hops much longer than originally intended; instead of a real grapefruit punch, the hops come across as herbal. A few tweaks and better planning to put this out in the late spring, and I think it'll really be a winner.

American Dark Wheat

Batch size: 5 gallons
Projected OG: 1.046
Projected SRM: 29.1
Projected IBU: 26.4
Boil time: 70 minutes
Brewhouse efficiency: 75%   

Grains
54.8% - 5 lb Great Western 2-row
32.9% - 3 lb White Wheat
8.2% - 12 oz Midnight Wheat
4.1% - 6 oz Bairds Dark Crystal

Hops

.3 oz Millennium (15.9%) (60 min)
.5 oz Cascade (5.5%) (30 min)
.5 oz Cascade (5 min)
1 oz Cascade (dry hop - 2 days)

Yeast
WLP090 San Diego Super Yeast

Extras
1 tsp Yeast nutrient (5 min)
.5 tablet Whirlfloc (5 min)

Water additions (mash)
4 g Gypsum
1 g Salt
4 g CaCl
1 ml Lactic acid (88%)

Brewday: 18 September 2016
Mash: 154F for 60 minutes
Pre-boil volume: 7.4 gallons
Pre-boil SG: 9.4P (1.037)

5.5 gallons into fermenter.
Fermented in swamp cooler at 63F ambient.

Water Profile: Reno
Target profile: Balanced Profile (brewersfriend.com)
70.9 Ca, 3.0 Mg, 22.0 Na, 83.7 Cl, 71.4 SO4
Alkalinity 20.6, RA -31.7 (ppm as CaCO3); 5.3 mash pH

Dry hop: 21 September 2016
Added as fermentation slowed, but hadn’t finished completely.

Bottled: 30 October 2016
FG: 1.011
ABV: 4.7%
Bottled with 4 oz light brown sugar.

Sample was fairly neutral. Bottled more than a full month after intended; not a lot of dry hop character, but also not super vegetal, thankfully.