Banana Bread Ale

**DeathBrewer** · 11-23-2008, 09:38 PM

With all this banana and peanut butter stuff flying around lately, i wanted to revisit one of my favorite recipes.

This recipe came from what was originally an accident. I was experimenting with different things and decided to use belgian munich and british chocolate to get that chewy, bready profile in a dunkelweizen. i also strayed from my usual WLP380 and went with my usual hefeweizen yeast choice: WLP300. then when the fan in my chiller crapped out on me, the fermentation temp rose to the mid 70s and made a fruity mess of my beer!

at first i was angry

my experiment was ruined...i couldn't compare it to my other dunkelweizens! but after letting it carb and get cold, i pulled a pint and got a wondrous surprise. it smelled like banana bread! nice thick rocky head held the aroma in...making me reminisce of my mother's baking throughout the whole glass. it tastes very nice and bready with banana and other pleasant fruity flavors, but the aroma was undeniable. and so Banana Bread Ale was born!

i've made it a couple of times, different variations of munich malt and chocolate malt, but this time i decided to take it one step further.

i'm adding oats to make the head even better. i think the oats will work well with the bready character, too. i'm adding carapils for mouthfeel and even more chewiness. last but certainly not least, i'm adding the British 50/60 crystal malt that i get from my LHBS. i've used it in a number of ales and it never dissapoints. the munich, chocolate and crystal malts all have that lovely grainy, bready characteristic, so i think this one will go over the top.

i also changed the hops. my usual is tettnanger or sometimes fuggle for bittering only. i wanted something softer, so i used styrian golding for the 60 min addition. i'm also finishing with EKG, to compliment the chocolate malt and round out the flavor.

in the future, i may throw some bananas and nuts in the mash to further this experiment, but for now i decided to stick with grains.

Here's the recipe. This will be one of my stovetop all-grains. I'll let you know how it goes!

Quote:

Banana Bread Ale

A ProMash Recipe Report

BJCP Style and Style Guidelines
-------------------------------

15-B German Wheat and Rye Beer, Dunkelweizen

Min OG: 1.044 Max OG: 1.056
Min IBU: 10 Max IBU: 18
Min Clr: 14 Max Clr: 23 Color in SRM, Lovibond

Recipe Specifics
----------------

Batch Size (Gal): 5.50 Wort Size (Gal): 5.50
Total Grain (Lbs): 11.75
Anticipated OG: 1.055 Plato: 13.63
Anticipated SRM: 15.8
Anticipated IBU: 19.0
Brewhouse Efficiency: 70 %
Wort Boil Time: 60 Minutes

Pre-Boil Amounts
----------------

Evaporation Rate: 15.00 Percent Per Hour
Pre-Boil Wort Size: 6.47 Gal
Pre-Boil Gravity: 1.047 SG 11.67 Plato

Grain/Extract/Sugar

% Amount Name Origin Potential SRM
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
51.1 6.00 lbs. Wheat Malt America 1.038 2
34.0 4.00 lbs. Munich Malt Great Britain 1.037 6
8.5 1.00 lbs. Flaked Oats America 1.033 2
2.1 0.25 lbs. Cara-Pils Dextrine Malt 1.033 2
2.1 0.25 lbs. Crystal 55L Great Britian 1.034 55
2.1 0.25 lbs. Chocolate Malt Great Britain 1.034 475

Potential represented as SG per pound per gallon.

Hops

Amount Name Form Alpha IBU Boil Time
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
2.00 oz. Styrian Goldings Pellet 1.90 16.6 60 min.
0.75 oz. Goldings - E.K. Pellet 4.50 2.5 5 min.

Yeast
-----

White Labs WLP300 Hefeweizen Ale

Mash Schedule
-------------

Mash Type: Single Step

Grain Lbs: 11.75
Water Qts: 13.00 - Before Additional Infusions
Water Gal: 3.25 - Before Additional Infusions

Qts Water Per Lbs Grain: 1.11 - Before Additional Infusions

Saccharification Rest Temp : 154 Time: 60
Mash-out Rest Temp : 0 Time: 0
Sparge Temp : 170 Time: 10

Total Mash Volume Gal: 4.19 - Dough-In Infusion Only

All temperature measurements are degrees Fahrenheit.

alright, let's get this party started!

fivehoursfree · 11-24-2008, 02:00 AM

Can you help some brutha's out with a partial mash version?

**DeathBrewer** · 11-24-2008, 03:44 AM

sure, it won't be quite the same, but still be good:

something like this outta do it, cuts down the grains to about 5 lbs:

2 lbs wheat
2 lbs munich
0.5 lbs oats
0.25 lbs carapils
0.25 lbs chocolate
0.25 lbs crystal 50/60

and add 4 lbs Wheat DME

session went ok. i got lower efficiency than expected (60%) due to heavy grains, a hurried sparge (temp was 160°F) and the minimal amount of water. i guess that's what i should expect when i do AG this way without a colander.

still tastes nice and bready...great flavor, can't wait to see what the yeast does to it.

**zac** · 11-24-2008, 03:58 AM

can I steal this recipie? I know SWMBO would enjoy this.

**DeathBrewer** · 11-24-2008, 04:06 AM

no! you can't! IT'S MINE!!! bwaahahahahahahaaaa!!!!

(ok, you can have it

)

ApolloSpeed · 11-24-2008, 08:52 AM

this sounds wonderful.... I've never heard of, nor tried a banana bread ale.

Does it really need 2.75 oz of hops?

do ya think I could sub Crystal 55L Great Britian for AHS's Crystal 60L ?? And AHS doesn't have EK Goldings......whats the best sub? Fuggles? or maybe NZ Goldings?

**DeathBrewer** · 11-24-2008, 03:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ApolloSpeed

this sounds wonderful.... I've never heard of, nor tried a banana bread ale.

Does it really need 2.75 oz of hops?

do ya think I could sub Crystal 55L Great Britian for AHS's Crystal 60L ?? And AHS doesn't have EK Goldings......whats the best sub? Fuggles? or maybe NZ Goldings?

i've never heard of it either. dunkelweizen is one of my favorite recipes and i make it pretty often. this one was just a fluke.

it only uses to ounces of hops for bittering because i'm using 1.9% alpha acid styrian goldings. you could definitely use a different bittering hop. fuggle or any noble hop would work fine as a replacement for bittering or aroma.

as for subbing crystal, yes that would work and give you a similar flavor. i simply wanted to go with all british grains because of their bready, biscuity qualities.

**DeathBrewer** · 11-24-2008, 03:19 PM

i pitched the vial of yeast by itself last night. any minimal stress caused by underpitching will simply add more banana. the carboy is sitting at about 70°F right now. i'll throw an ice pack to cool a few degrees ONLY if it goes above 75°F.

Danek · 11-24-2008, 03:52 PM

I tried a Banana Bread Beer from Wells ( Charles Wells Banana Bread Beer - Charles Wells Brewery - BeerAdvocate ) and TBH I thought it was pretty gross - cloyingly sweet, and with way too much banana. I think your recipe with the breadiness of the munich and the chocolate malt actually sounds a lot nicer.

**DeathBrewer** · 11-25-2008, 02:28 PM

started fermenting away last night at 74°F. was at a little over 76°F this morning, so i threw some ice packs in. will check on it at lunch to ensure its in the mid-low 70s.

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