By Greg B.  Thus far, I’ve produced 3 beers for friends of mine who have graduated.  Truth be told, I’m running out of graduating friends (at least in the near future), so enjoy these articles while they last!  But I’ve decided that I should just let the person pick a beer that they want, some general style or something they want to drink and I’ll make it, according to whatever specifications I think are appropriate.  Fair deal right?  Well, I think so too!  Lets see how I made this one.

I’ll admit, with the summer time here, my brewing levels has slowed.  For a few reasons.  First, it’s difficult to regulate the temperature of my house, and with some of these beers, I don’t want them to ferment at too high a temp.  So I don’t make as much beer in the summer.  Also, my beer making budget has become a pig-roast budget, since the increased risk of making a not-as-great batch of beer increases, I want to use those funds for something equally fun, hence a pig roast!  But, seeing as how I need to brew for the upcoming graduation, I dusted off and cleaned my pots and spoons and equipment, and set about making a Belgian Wit with a touch of peach.  I think this is actually a pretty good recipe for Ms. Kathryn (Katie) Burke, the beer will turn out for a nice dry finish but will be light and refreshing from start to finish both on the eyes and to taste.  For this recipe, you will need:

Grain Bill:

• 6.64lb US  2-row pale
• 2lb torrified wheat
• 1.75lb cara-pils
• 1lb flaked oats

Everything Else:

• 1oz hallertau hops (pellets)
• 1oz bitter orange peel
• .5oz cracked coriander seed
• WLP400 Belgian wit yeast (suspension
• WLP400 Belgian wit yeast (skimmed from previous beer and saved in the fridge)
• 2oz peach flavor

The goals for this beer were as follows:  use real bitter orange peel, not sweet orange peel.  Use real cracked coriander seeds not coriander powder.  Make it as deliciously crisp as possible and end with a nice dryness, which will go great with seafood but give this beer a nice summery aroma/flavor of peach as an undertone.  Not overwhelming, but definitely present.  I think this recipe hits it right on the nose.  I used a single decoction mash with a strike temp of 171F so I’d get 157F and I mashed for 90 minutes, monitoring the temp and heating as needed (kept it between 152 and 158F).  I rinsed the grains and brought the boil volume up to around 5.5 gallons and began the boil.  .5oz hops at for 40 minutes and another .5oz hops 10 minutes later.  In the last 15 minutes of the 60 minute boil, I added the 1oz bitter orange peel, .5oz cracked coriander seeds and a teaspoon of Irish moss for clarity.  I crash cooled the wort in a sink full of cold water and ice to 80F, then transferred the wort to the sterilized primary fermenter.  I only got about 3.5-4 gallons of clean wort from this (while trying to not transfer the leftover protein matrix from , but the gravity was around 1.045).  I think with a gravity like this and this yeast strain, I’ll probably end up with a  final gravity around 1.008, a nice dry, crisp Belgian wit.  But right now it’s bubbling away downstairs, so only time will tell!  The wort began to bubble in about 4-6 hrs, which is incredibly fast but probably due to the  extra dose of yeast I added and the warmer temperatures of the house.

I had a friend of mine design the label for this one.  When the bottles are ready, the “Picaroon Peach: Belgian wit + a bit of peach” will be on the label.  After 5 years of homebrewing and losing bottles and being unsure what bottles are which, I think it’s time I matured a bit and began to label them appropriately!

**Update June 28th** I moved this beer from the primary to the secondary.  The gravity had dropped just slightly below 1.010, it’s steady on it’s way towards that dry crisp beer I wanted.  I also added about 2 oz of peach flavoring in the secondary.  This beer will stay here, hopefully not more than a week, but we will see (pig roast is coming up).  I had a ton of yeast on the top of the beer, so I skimmed as much as I could and saved it in a labeled container in my fridge.  I had used some yeast from the previous Belgian wit I made in this batch, and it would be pretty good to use the same strain repeatedly, augmenting it with a vial of new yeast from White Labs.