As a child of the 80’s, I grew up watching Wil Wheaton on TV (Star Trek, Stand by Me). When I recently found out that he is also a home brewer – well, I knew that a beer needed to made in his honor.

Yesterday, I noticed that FH Steinbarts (my LHBS) is going to be hosting a wheat beer competition in May… an entry recipe immediately came to mind.

“Wil Wheat” is going to be a basic american wheat beer, but with a few twists:

• Galaxy hops rather then a noble, or american variety
• Triticale as an adjunct grain.
• Rouge Pacman yeast for extra nerdiness.

Recipe Specifics

• Style: 6-D American Wheat/Rye
• Batch Size (Gal): 12.00 (for 10 bottled)
• Anticipated OG: 1.049
• Anticipated ABV: 5%
• Anticipated SRM: 4 (very light)
• Anticipated IBU: 27 ( Tinseth)
• Brewhouse Efficiency:  80%
• Wort Boil Time: 60Minutes

Grain/Extract/Sugar

A basic wheat recipe is just 2-row and white wheat. I plan to add a small amount of triticale to maximize head retention. Triticale is a wheat/rye hybrid – not to be confused with quadrotriticale. Here is an abstract of an article that describes the “use of unmalted triticale in brewing and its effect on wort and beer quality“.

• 10 lbs Pale 2-row (US)
• 10 lb White Wheat
• 0.5 lb Unmalted Triticale

Hops

Galaxy is an high alpha Australian variety. It was accentually quite difficult to find a US supplier. The aroma profile is described a citrus/passion-fruit, which should work perfectly in this beer.

• 1 oz. Galaxy 13% @ 60 min
• 1 oz. Galaxy 13% @ 10 min

Water

• Munic profile: per 5 gallons add
• – 3.5g Chalk
• Strike 30 quarts at 165°F
• – Add water slowly and mix thoroughly, or the wheat will clump
• – It’s OK to bring up the temp slowly
• Mash at 152°F (low is better then higher)
• Boil for 60+ minutes.

Yeast

You would normally use a clean american ale yeast. Pacman seems to fit th bill, but I could not find many examples of it’s use in a wheat beer.

• Pacman
• 1 week @ 60F
• 1 week up to 70F

Brew Day Notes

Finally had a chance to brew this up on 3/27. Everything went smoothly.

I used quite a bit of rice hulls and added to the mash slowly: grain, water, grain… This worked very well. I hit the mash temp exactly and didn’t have any problems with stuck mash.

The only issue was a lower OG then expected (1.046 vs 1.049). This calculated to 75% efficiency instead of the expected 80%. Afterwards, I realized that the problem was my crush. Unlike barley, the size of the wheat kernels varied drastically. This meant that a small percentage slipped through without being crushed. Next time, I either need a smaller grind, or just a bit more wheat.

However, this will produce an ABV around 4.5% – so, well within the appropriate range for an American Wheat.

Label

I used the same template as the other 22’s – but added a real image this time. The photo is “A Wide Field Image of the Galactic Center” via Astronomy Picture of the Day.

Data

Gabriel Nagmay^Wil Wheat^^25^21^12^60^10^4^80^100^8.8^0.3^0.8^0.7^0.4^0^70^70^10^101^100^10^101^100^0.5^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^0^15^1^60^0^1^15^1^10^0^1^0^0^0^0^1^0^0^0^0^1^0^0^0^0^1^0^0^0^0^1^1^60^150^1.5^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^13^13^0^0^0^0^0.2^

Via wilwheaton.typepad.com