Ingredients

1.2 lbs. flaked wheat, 4 lbs. Alexander’s Sun Country pale malt LME, 1 lb. CBW Bavarian Wheat LME, 2 lbs Munton’s wheat DME 2 pounds wheat DME, 1 lb. Brewer’s Garden Belgian Dark Candy Sugar (beet sugar), .75 oz. fresh Czech Saaz hops (bittering), Belgian Abbey Style Ale Wyeast 1762 liquid yeast, Wild & Sour lactobacillus blend Wyeast 5335

Recipe

This recipe was adapted from the Lindeman’s lambic clone recipe at byo.com. We steeped the flaked wheat for 30 minutes at 150 degrees Fahrenheit before removing the grain bag. Brought to a boil, removed from the burner and added the LME, DME, and sugar candy. Returned to the burner, brought to a boil and then added the hops in a hop bag. Boiled for one hour. Cool with wort chiller and pitched the yeast and lactobacillus together in the primary.

Brew Notes

We made a starter of the yeast (without the lactobacillus blend) of some of the excess wheat LME. The starter was very aggressive, almost overflowing the flask at one point. After pitching the yeast along with the lactobacillus blend we saw signs of active fermentation within three hours. In the middle of the night we woke up to the airlock spewing foam and had to rig a blow off valve for the rest of the night. The fermentation was extremely vigorous and filled the entire headspace for several days.

We added the dark candy sugar to boost the ABV a little bit inspired by the previous Belgian Tripel recipie. We are planning to add a fruit addition during secondary. To be safe for future batches I scrubbed the carboy the best I could and did a strong PBW wash to kill off any wild strains from lingering in the carboy.

Tasting Notes

Really good before any fruit additions! I’m hesitant to even try the fruit additions on this batch because it is so good already.