Boulevard Wheat Beer

While in Kansas City last weekend I followed my usual practice of sampling whatever local beer I can get my hands on. My general rule of thumb when traveling is to order the first beer I've never heard. This time it was Boulevard Brewing Company's Wheat Beer. This beer is an American Wheat as opposed to a German Weizen. Two things I noticed right off were the lack of hop character and fullness of body. I tend to find wheat beer a little thin, and was pleasantly surprised by the unexpected body. I also liked the lower bitterness levels (personally I brew my American Wheat to 27 IBU's which is the top of the range). After some Googling I found Boulevard's Wheat beer to be only 13 IBU's, using Magnum and Simcoe. Of particular interest was their use of red wheat malt. More research found a general consensus that red wheat malt offers a more rounded and fuller wheat profile (something I certainly detected) and a sometimes 'floury' contribution that I interpreted as 'bready'. Interestingly, I found neither of the top two homebrew supply vendors offer red wheat, though several smaller internet shops do. I don't know when I'll brew my next wheat beer but I'm certain it will contain at least a small percentage of red wheat malt. Let the experimentation begin.