Honey Grisette

Grisette, a relatively unknown style of beer, is a farmhouse ale with origins with the miners in the Hainut province in southern Belgium.  Basically, what Saison is to farmers, Grisette is to miners.  Traditionally, a grisette is lighter and lower in alcohol when compared to a saison, and generally features a generous amount of wheat. Grisette literally means "grey", a reference to the color of the outfits of the female factory workers that would hand out the beer to the miners at the end of the day.

For my second beer utilizing WY3725 (the first was a Dark Saison I brewed the day before), I wanted to brew a grisette, but make it my own by adding honey.  I read that Shaun Hill uses 15-20% honey in his honey saisons, so chose that as a target amount.  Choosing the variety of honey required a little more thought.  For this beer, knowing I was going to use WY3725 as the yeast, I wanted to have an subtle tart and earthy flavor profile with a little bit of citrus in the background. So to help accentuate the citrus, I decided to use Orange Blossom Honey added at flame out to provide a little bit of flavor, but not overpower the other ingredients in the beer.

"Grisette de Miel"
Breweed 11 August 2013 by myself
Batch size: 5.25 gallons
OG: 1.044
FG: 1.003
IBU: 25
SRM: 3.6
60 minute boil

Fermentables
4 lbs. Rahr 2-row
2 lbs. Rahr Red Wheat
8 oz. Whole Foods Quick Oats
8 oz. Flaked Rye
1 lb. Orange Blossom Honey added at flameout

Hops
0.35 oz. Warrior @ 60 minutes (16% AA)
2.00 oz. Styrian Goldings @ 5 minutes (4% AA)

Yeast
WY3725 - Biere de Garde 2L starter made 8/8/2013, pitched 750ml

Misc.
1 tablet Whirlfloc, and 1/2 tsp. yeast nutrient added at 15 min.

Mash
60 minutes at 152F

Water
Carbon Filtered DC tap water with 2g gypsum and 2g CaCl2 added to the mash and 2 gallons and 1.2g gypsum and 1.6g CaCl2 added to the sparge
Ca: 89 ppm
Mg: 5 ppm
Na: 15 ppm
Cl: 84 ppm
SO4: 99 ppm

Notes

Collected 6 gallons of 1.034 runnings (75% efficiency)
Chilled to 88F, put if fridge to cool to 70F
~8 hours later pitched decanted starter, left at 68F ambient to ferment, solid fermentation 12 hours later
Ramped temperature up to ~80F after 2 days

8/20/2013 - 1.003, nice but not too much yeast character, apparent orange earthiness from honey

8/24/2013 - Needed fermenter so I kegged with 4.5 oz. table sugar and .25 oz. chamomile in 8 oz. water

9/1/2013 - put on tap