Sweet without the color

[dickshindles]

So, my current house strain finishes up at around 1.5P. It is a Saison blend. I am attempting to make a lighter colored beer with more residual sweetness and body in the end. Can you recommend a good malt to use at around 25% grist? I will also mash at a higher temp, although this has not proven to add many points in the end.

[Mills]

When you want sweetness you can go a couple of ways, two of them are crystal malts or adjusting bittering. Gambrinus has their honey malt which is low lovibond and can contribute sweetness. Also play with your sweetness level by dialing your bitterness down. Low FG does not = non sweet, so your goal shouldn't be simply elevating your FG. Low terminal gravity beers can retain an impression of sweetness.

What are some of the parameters of the beer you want to craft?

[HinduKush]

Raise your mash temp to 160 F.

[dickshindles]

Well, it's along the lines of a Wit beer. I'll be using base malt with extraction of 80%, and a small amount of torrified wheat. In the past, I've used Wit yeast. My aggressive Saison yeast has been known to go below 1 in certain cases. I fear the body will be lacking, and it will be too dry. Dry is okay for a wit, but I think you see where I am going with this. As Mill pointed out, low bittering helps. This will be low, as it is a Wit.

[Jeff Lockhart]

Body

Raising mash temp is a good start as well as decreasing hop usage. If you monitor your gravity through fermentation, you can also stop it when you reach your target gravity ( I assume you have the ability to crash the FV). Crisp Dextrine malt has very low color and doesn't contribute easy fermentables.

Good luck.

[Ted Briggs]

Carapils malt- very light carmel malt

[Woolsocks]

Supposedly carapils doesn't contribute any flavor at all, and if you've ever tasted it, you probably agree.

Briess does produce a very light caramel malt (10°L) that might help you. Or, if you filter the beer, you can back-sweeten it with something like honey or candi syrup during or after filtration.

[TwelveBarBrews]

I'm using CaraPils (Dextrine malt is the generic term) to adjust body in my lighter beers. Works great. I want to leave my beers relatively dry so I've been using about 4-5% in addition to my coloring malts. Of course YMMV if you want to get to a very sweet beer.