a.k.a. Dr. Mario’s Artemisia Absinthium Elixer or Wormwood Beer for short. This beer is an experimental. Coming out of one of Bakfish’s homebrew challenges, we were each given grab bags of ingredients from Hopping Grape Homebrew Supply. My grab bag contents included:
- 5 lbs. of Unmalted Wheat
- 1 lb. of Double Roasted Crystal
- 1 oz of Galena Hops
- 1 oz of Callista Hops
- 1 bag of Artemisia Absinthium / Wormwood Herb
When I opened the bag, I have to admit, I was kind of excited by the double roasted crystal grains and hops selections… but then I saw the wormwood. What the hell is “wormwood.” So I googled it. Wormwood, a bitter herb that is good for your gut. Also used in the making of Absinthe spirit. Eyebrows raised… ok, sure. And so I set off to make a tea. I put one teaspoon of wormwood in a cup of hot water and let it steep. Then I drank it. My tongue went numb. There is not a strong smell at all, but the bitterness is a train wreck. I mean, my palate was destroyed. So I dialed it back. No difference. Dialed it back again… at this point, it all tasted 40x worse than licorice. WTF.
And so I tabled the whole experiment for two months. BUT all things come due, and thus, this beer is due in September, I finally just said, the hell with it, I’m making a beer. So I worked up my own recipe. I went with 6-row in hopes that the higher diastatic power would help in breaking down the starches of the raw unmalted wheat. AND, I only used a pound of the raw material. This in hopes of drawing out some sugars and breaking it down, I also ran a 90 minute mash. But the question remained… how much wormwood to use? We went with three teaspoons, and I mixed this herb into the grain, post grind process, in three even sections. We used almost 9 gallons of water to make our five gallon batch. So one teaspoon of wormwood per gallon of water. Absorption, boil off, and trube accounts for the missing four gallons.
Original Gravity: 1.063
Final Gravity: 1.018
ABV: 5.91%
Fermentables: 13.5 lbs. - 6 Row 1.0 lb. - Unmalted (Raw) Wheat 1.0 lb. - Double Roasted Crystal 0.5 lb. - Torrified Wheat 0.5 lb. - Flaked Corn 3 tsp. - Artemisia Absinthium / Wormwood Boil (hops in pellet form): 1.0 - Galena (12.4 AA) @60 0.5 - Galena (12.4 AA) @30 0.5 - Galena (12.4 AA) @Whirlpool Dry Hop (hops in pellet form): 1.0 - Callista (3.0 AA) Yeast – NO STARTER: Saf-ale US-05
Special Instructions:
This may be too much wormwood. The verdict is still out, but the wort was very bitter. I tried to dial back the bitter hops or amount thereof because I knew the wormwood would be a bittering agent. I also thought 1 tsp per 3 gallons of water would be an appropriate ratio, but I think it was too much. If anything, I would recommend cutting this in half until you know you want more bitterness in the beer. Will update soon as we know more.