Spring beer

March beer is the first brew of the year, made from the fresh crop of malts and hops. It is a mellow, fruity beer with a full flavor - floral aromas, fruitiness and subtle notes of roasted and caramelized malt. The beer has an elegant well-balanced bitterness. Every year in March when nature is reawakening, March beer arrives to tickle the palate and announce the coming of spring.

Spring beer first made its appearance some 600 years ago, in the Northern French town of Arras. Emerging from the winter chill, the master brewers prepared a fresh, light beer. Made from malt from the last barley harvest, this golden beer was traditionally placed in vats around October and stored in the naturally cold winter temperatures to reach maturity in the springtime after three months cellaring. Thus it became known as "spring beer."

Ingredients
4 lbs Wheat/Malt extract
3 lbs Light malt extract
1/2 lb Honey
1 lb Crystal malt
1 lb Light DME
2 oz Hallertauer (boil 60 minutes)
1/2 oz Hallertauer (finish 2 mins)
Wyeast Bavarian wheat yeast
Procedure
Steep dry grains in 1.5 gallons water @ 150F for 20 minutes, remove from grains from water. Bring wort to boil and add extract, honey, DME and bittering hops. Boil for 58 minutes. Add flavoring hops and boil for 2 minutes. Remove from heat and cool, transfer to fermenter, pitch yeast. Ferment for 14 days at 70F.