Joyce's Lemon Birthday wheat

My second wheat. Added some wheat malt for complexity. Added the lemon for, well,.... we'll see!

Brewer:	Rathole		Email:	am1nightcreature@yahoo.com
Beer:	Joyce's Lemon Birthday wheat		Style:	American Wheat
Type:	Extract w/grain		Size:	5 gallons
Color:	6 HCU (~5 SRM)		Bitterness:	17 IBU
OG:	1.052		FG:	1.012
Alcohol:	5.2% v/v (4.1% w/w)
Grain:	1 lb. Wheat malt
Steep:	Steeped grain in grain bag in one gallon water at 155° for 30 minutes
Boil:	60 minutes	SG 1.052	5 gallons
	3 lb. Light dry wheat malt extract 3.3 lb. Wheat extract
	After steeping grains, add about 1 1/2 cups of wheat DME and bittering hops to the one gallon mixture of steeped grains, boil 45 minutes Add the above to main boil pot, add remainder of extract. Bring to boil, additional 15 minutes. Add flavoring hops last ten minutes. In last five minutes of boil, add the frozen juice of 5-6 fresh lemons to boil. I did this as a frozen cube of the juice. Just as the wort comes to a boil, I flamed out and turned on the wort chiller. This is all in an attempt to keep the color lighter. My brewing buddy made a lemon lager in a similar manner, and the color turned out very light. He speculated that the lemon juice lightened the beer, i'm hoping the juice does the same thing here. Plus, a slice of lemon in a wheat ain't too bad at all! No Irish moss in an attempt to keep it cloudy per style
Hops:	1 oz. Hallertauer (3.9% AA, 60 min.) 1 oz. Saaz (2.5% AA, 10 min.)
Yeast:	Danstar "Nottingham" dry yeast, rehydrated per instructions
Log:	Brewed today 6/3/2005. Actual OG 1.050 6/6/05: For some reason, fermentation (65°) was so violent initially that it kept clogging the gas trap and I went to a blowoff tube. I think the wheat malt gave good head retention to the krausen, clogging the tube. It has settled down and I'm back to a trap. 6/9: Transferred to secondary, SG 1.014 and still working a little. Taste test: Nummy! Lightly Lemony, not too citric, just right. The lemon really added something nice. 6/27 kegged and force carbonated
Carbonation:	force carbonated 30 PSI at 70° too impatient to cool first... rechecked at 38° and it didn't take any more CO2 at 14 PSI
Tasting:	6/29 Tried it from the keg, it needs a couple more days to absorb the CO2. Still tasty with a lemon edge, not overpowering. Chill haze fits the style, we'll see if it drops out 6/30 nice wheat. fully carbonated. Joyce suggests using the juice of 3-4 lemons just to tone it down a bit, vs the amount I used. She still likes it a lot. I think it's pretty much dandy. I also think the lemon will fade a bit with age, it's still young. Not overpowering lemon, just a personal preference 7/20: Lemon character has faded a good bit. Crisp zesty taste, only a slight lemony taste you have to be looking for, nice and light. It has a nice slight citrus tang that suggests more IBU's than it really has. Chill haze has pretty much dropped out, this yeast does not leave a haze. Nice copper color, but darker than I would really like. Good summertime wheat that all my friends seem to like. I would not change this recipie, except maybe to double the saaz if I felt like a hoppier wheat, but it's just fine as is. Also, I would like it lighter in color, so I would use the same boil, but use all dry extract to bring the color down, adjusting to get the same OG.

Recipe posted 06/10/05.