04/30/11

Summer Wheat Beer with Coriander and Links to Great Summer Beers

Today was a gorgeous day, if a bit windy - sunny, everything green and verdant from all our recent rain.  A perfect day to brew outside! 

I haven't brewed for a while, been waiting for a day like this so I could do it in the backyard.  I decided to use ingredients I had on-hand and make a summer wheat beer with coriander.  It will be light, dry, refreshing with a slight citrus flavor from the coriander.  I used one ounce of coriander seeds, ground by hand in a mortar and pestle, added in the last five minutes of the boil. 

As with most of our beers, this is made with organic malts and hops.  The recipe included 4 lbs of wheat malt, 4 lbs of pilsener malt, and 2 lbs of munich malt, mashed at 156 degrees. Hop varieties used include pacific gem, hallertauer and cascade.  For this beer, we used a dry yeast called Nottingham and are fermenting the wort at 60 degrees. 

I didn't pay close enough attention to my volumes this brew - I was aiming for a 5.5 gallon batch but ended up with 6 gallons.  That means the beer will be a little lighter, which is fine for a summer beer.

Stay tuned for updates on this beer. 

Here are links to some of my favorite commercial 'summer' beers:

Metropolitan Brewing's Krankshaft, a Kolsch-style beer made by a great Chicago brewery;
Goose Island's Green Line, a pale ale that means summer to me because the first time I tried it was at an outdoor Grant Park Symphony concert two summers ago - part of what makes a great summer beer is the associations we carry;
Pilsner is a great summer beer style and one of my favorite pilsners is made in Berkeley, California - Trumer Pils;
Blanche de Chambly is a Belgian-style Witbier or White Ale made by Unibroue in Quebec;