Say Goodbye - The Last Bottle of Leuvens Witbier

I plan to make reusable labels and this beer
will be one of the beers in a steady enough rotation
that it will get its own label.

Usually in my brewing experience I am always 4-5 recipes ahead in my mind.  This means that sometimes I forget to really enjoy the beer that I have brewed and more importantly enjoyed.

One of my latest beers was a wit.  I was originally calling it a Peeterman Wit only to find out that that I was wrong in how  I categorized the brew.  It was not a brown beer like the Peeterman would of been.  This left me with the Leuvens Witbier.

These beers were most likely tart and citrusy from the coriander and lactobacillus and some fruit bitterness from the orange peel you typically find in your witbiers.

After reading "Brewing with Wheat" it seems that Jolly Pumpkins Calabaza Blanca may be the modern interpretation of what these beers might of tasted like.

I used the White Labs 550 that Jolly Pumpkin is said to use along with bottle dregs from two of their 750 mL Calabaza Blancas.

White beer in a Winter setting while the white stuff falls to
the ground.  Makes sense. Right?

At first the beer was sweet with little carbonation.  Initially it smelled like Jolly Pumpkin but it just tasted too sweet and citrusy.  It was a good beer then.  Just lacking carbonation.  But as the beer aged it started to morph into a great beer.  The funk from the Jolly Pumpkin dregs started to take over.  The beer dried out and became much more effervescent in the bottle.  At the 5-6 week mark this beer was in its prime and it was very reminiscent of Calabaza Blanca.

It tasted good enough that I plan to remake the batch.  Soon.

I am harvesting the yeast from the last few bottles.  I believe only bottle is left at this time. Once I collect the yeast from that last bottle I may do another batch within a month.  I have even decided to create a label for this beer which you see in the start of the post.

Until the next batch!