Rushing a Hefeweizen?

I am hosting a party/bbq on the 20th and wanted to have some homebrew on tap for it. Last night I brewed a 1.049 Hefeweizen w/ Weheinstephaner yeast. I'd like to have this carbed up within 12 days - can it be done? Is there any point in trying? I think my best course of action is to let it ferment for 5 days(ish) then force carb it as cold as I can. Any tips?

not likely if you are keeping the fermentation temperatures in the mid 60's. It normally takes a good 10 to 14 days on the yeast.

I wanna preface this by saying I don't recommend rushing any beer but a hefe is about the only brew you'd have a chance at doing this with. Keeping in mind that the only time I take a gravity reading of a beer is right before bottling, if I were you I'd pull a gravity reading at day 8 and another at day 10, if it hasn't changed, cold crash it over night and keg it the next day and it should be good to go. I actually quit kegging so I'm not a very good source of information on the topic but there is a method for getting your beer to carb up much faster in a keg. I'm sure a quick search or stoping by the bottling/kegging forum will find you 100 threads on the topic.

Hit it with 40 lbs of pressure for 2 days and then drop it down to serving pressure afterwards.

A hefe is the best emergency beer, IMO. I've gone grain to glass in 10 days in a pinch, but two weeks would be pretty standard for a hefe for me.

I would leave it on the yeast for 8-9 days. Then keg it, set your regulator to whatever pressure you decide to use, cool it overnight, then roll the keg back and forth on the ground until you don't hear bubbling anymore and then a few more minutes after that. It should be good enough in time for the bbq.

you'll end up with green beer. it takes time to make a good bavarian hefe. no breweries in germany serve these beers young like you're being told. 21 days is young for these brews. you can make a sad attempt (swill) in 12 days, but I'd never serve a brew like that to guests

OLDBREW said:

you'll end up with green beer. it takes time to make a good bavarian hefe. no breweries in germany serve these beers young like you're being told. 21 days is young for these brews. you can make a sad attempt (swill) in 12 days, but I'd never serve a brew like that to guests

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dang... to think i've been drinking swill all these years, since i love me some hefe's. i thought hefe's could be grain-glass in 17 days and be fine, or earlier in emergencies... as was said earlier, 9 days ferment, keg, cool overnight, roll slowly under pressure for an hour to charge... a hefeweizen is fine like that. i usually ferment a hefe 14 days, but i guess i know better now

well if you are drinking 12 day old hefeweizens, you are in fact drinking green swill. roll the keg all you want, it won't meld together for at least two to three days. I've forced carbonated beers in a couple hours. They still need conditioning under co2

I've done a couple "emergency hefes" in two weeks or less.

many thanks for the info. i'll post this to th site in general

OLDBREW said:

you'll end up with green beer. it takes time to make a good bavarian hefe. no breweries in germany serve these beers young like you're being told. 21 days is young for these brews. you can make a sad attempt (swill) in 12 days, but I'd never serve a brew like that to guests

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Lighten up.

you'll be fine. green hefe's are forgiving. most non brewers won't notice. served a green APA at last party and most comments where positive, one fellow brewer noticed young age. told him "yup come back in two weeks for any that's left"

is there such a thing as green hefeweizen after it's fermented out? my sarcastic bone is almost worn out...

that's why I said hefes are forgiving. after too long in keg need to get it cloudy again by a good shake. hefe is my second fav after a good pale ale

2 years ago we did an emergency hefe for Oktoberfest in under 2 weeks. When I realied I didn't have hefe yeast on hand I bought every variety of wheat beer the grocery store here sells-German, American and even Hoegaarden, I sat down with my son and daughter and drank as many of them as we could in one night, swirling the dregs and pitching them into a 2 liter starter. By the next afternoon we had good krausen in the starter so I brewed a 1.05ish hefe-50/50 wheat and pilsner malt. A week later it was at 1.012 so I kegged it, chilled it and carbonated it. It was perfect for Oktoberfest in about 12 days, it was the first keg finished, and the favorite. Since I brew 10 gallon batches I still had the second keg, but it didn't seem as good a couple of weeks later as the first one did.
last year I did my hefe in 8 days and once again the keg I served at Oktoberfest lasted less than an hour.

OLDBREW said:

well if you are drinking 12 day old hefeweizens, you are in fact drinking green swill.

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This statement means you don't know hefeweizens.

Anyway, brew the beer and ferment for 10 days. Carb it to 3.1 volumes and serve.

YES + to 3.1 CO2 makes a perfect head!

early drafts nice and fuzzy/ cloudy! small twist of lemon... mmmm

starrfish said:

small twist of lemon... mmmm

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Do not ruin a hefeweizen with lemon.

As many have said, a Hefeweizen is a GREAT quick beer (the best style for quick turnaround IMO). It is good when most beers are still green. 12 days is fine - ferment for 10 in primary, then keg, chill, and burst carbonate.

corkybstewart said:

... I sat down with my son and daughter and drank as many of them as we could in one night

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Yeah, now that's dedication right there!!! :fro:

Weizenwerks said:

Do not ruin a hefeweizen with lemon.

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no fruit just the oils from the rind! mmm like a good gin martini with a twist! just the oil!

starrfish said:

no fruit just the oils from the rind! mmm like a good gin martini with a twist! just the oil!

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You're breaking my heart!

Putting lemon in a hefeweizen is like putting steak sauce on a steak. It masks the flavor you are supposed to taste. Tase the beer and taste the steak. Leave the floofy stuff to the American wheat and fruit beer.

LOL just a twist! enhances the flavor. all good brings up the banana & clove which I love! mmm just a twist of rind.


more banana & clove the better! lemon oil helps!

Whatever floats your boat!

Keep on rockin' in the free world. :rockin:

I recently brewed a Hefe with a 2 liter starter of SN Kellerweis yeast. I fermented around 70 degrees in an open bucket, and the beer went from 1.048 to 1.010 in 2 days. I kegged on day 4, and started drinking on day 7. It made for a pretty nice Hefe! The only gripes I had with it were recipe based, and I noticed none of the green beer flavors I get with some other types of beer. I've been drinking it for about a month now, and I wouldn't say that it has gotten any better with age. If anything, some of the brighter clove flavors that it showed on day 7 are beginning to fade, though now more of the banana/bubble gum flavors are showing.
My $.02, Hefe is THE beer style that I'd choose for a quick turn around! Sure the flavors change with age, but they don't necessarily change for the better. It depends on the yeast you're using and what you like in a Hefe.

and I'm fussy about commercial hefes.

I've done a 7-day hefeweizen before. High krausen starter, 3 days primary, 4 days secondary, transfer to keg, force-shake-carbonate, chilled and served that night.

It was the first keg to float at homebrew club party.

If you're using a Weihenstephan yeast, you can pull it. If you're using an american ale/wheat yeast, well, that would be harder.

M_C

I'll add that if you want to be assured of non-swill pitch a big starter. Sounds like I'm not the only one that's rushed a hefe and been perfectly happy with the results. Is it better at 3 weeks? yeah, maybe a little.. but too long in the keg and it starts clearing up, to get that yeasty hefe haze you need to drink it young anyways.

Thanks for the helpful tips everyone, I'm pretty confident that this hefe will be delicious by the BBQ.

Weizenwerks said:

This statement means you don't know hefeweizens.

Anyway, brew the beer and ferment for 10 days. Carb it to 3.1 volumes and serve.

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sounds like you are not too well educated with traditional bavarian natural carb bottle/keg conditioning to make that statement.
this brings another complexity to the style

the earliest I know of is schneider and they re-ferment /condition for 14 days after a primary fermentation of 4 days.

ERDINGER Weissbier - the ultimate premium Weissbier

Erdinger Weissbier is not only the undisputed classic in the Erdinger product range, it is also quite simply the wheat beer par excellence.

It is brewed using fine yeast according to a traditional recipe and, of course, in strict accordance with the Bavarian Purity Law. Even today, the beer is still bottle-fermented in the traditional way; it takes three to four weeks for Erdinger Weissbier 'with fine yeast' to mature.

Paulaner process is a little different it is carbed and conditioned in their cellaring tanks, then bottled or keg at around 3 weeks. I'd think they would put it to market sooner if it were ready.

OLDBREW said:

sounds like you are not too well educated with traditional bavarian natural carb bottle/keg conditioning to make that statement.

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I was trained at Weihenstephan, thanks. I'm well aware of traditional brewing practices. The OP asked how he could do it, not how I would do it.

You can carbonate to specific volumes using Reinheitsgebot methods, it just involves math I won't get into here.

OLDBREW said:

sounds like you are not too well educated with traditional bavarian natural carb bottle/keg conditioning to make that statement

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Weizenwerks said:

I was trained at Weihenstephan, thanks

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I think you just won at the internet.

dwarven_stout said:

I think you just won at the internet.

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wow, way to keep it classy. I can't even believe I'm justifying that with a response.

Back to topic, something this thread has strayed from, the OP asked if it could be done. The answer is that a lot of us have done it with a good deal of success. Will it be better if given a few extra weeks, probably, but unless you have a time machine stored away in the brew closet then it doesn't matter. Best of luck to you Soma, I'm sure you will be satisfied with the results. You will have to try the same recipe and give it a little more time to see the differences for yourself.

rjschroed said:

wow, way to keep it classy. I can't even believe I'm justifying that with a response.

Back to topic, something this thread has strayed from, the OP asked if it could be done.

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Oh, it was unclassed long before that.

As to your second jab, you might notice that your answer has been given multiple times over 4 pages, including by me on the first page, and the OP has stated a couple times that he feels reassured that his beer will be well received at the party. It looks like most all of us win at the internet.

I love everyone equally.

dwarven_stout said:

Oh, it was unclassed long before that.

As to your second jab, you might notice that your answer has been given multiple times over 4 pages, including by me on the first page, and the OP has stated a couple times that he feels reassured that his beer will be well received at the party. It looks like most all of us win at the internet.

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I'm not trying to start a pissing match so I apologize if I've offended you. Perhaps I could've handled it differently but just asking you if you could try to keep it a little more classy than that from now on. The willingness of people to help with any question on this site without worrying about being torched for saying something that others don't agree with is part of what makes this place so darn great.

rjschroed said:

I'm not trying to start a pissing match so I apologize if I've offended you. Perhaps I could've handled it differently but just asking you if you could try to keep it a little more classy than that from now on.

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Well, I'm not offended, but I think it's a little funny that you decided to jump on me and not the guy who's been going on about "swill" and calling people uneducated for 3 pages.

The willingness of people to help with any question on this site without worrying about being torched for saying something that others don't agree with is part of what makes this place so darn great.

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Look, some people rightly deserve a torching. One guy got one here for assuming that he was the only "expert" in the room.

Weizenwerks said:

I was trained at Weihenstephan, thanks. I'm well aware of traditional brewing practices. The OP asked how he could do it, not how I would do it.

You can carbonate to specific volumes using Reinheitsgebot methods, it just involves math I won't get into here.

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Are you're saying you have a degree B Sc, M Sc in brewing science from the TUM at theWeihenstephan center, or what do you mean by being trained there?
Were you a graduate of the master brewers diploma program? how long was your stay, what's your name? Is this paul?

I've been brewing german wheat beers for more then half your life.

so you are saying a 10 day old wheat beer isn't green beer as in "not matured yet" (not "green" as not being fermented)? could you tell me how long it would take to properly carbonate/condition 5 gals of hefeweizen 5-5.5% abv to 3.1 volumes after 10 days on the yeast?

OLDBREW said:

Are you're saying you have a degree B Sc, M Sc in brewing science from the TUM at theWeihenstephan center, or what do you mean by being trained there?

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http://portal.mytum.de/studium/studiengaenge_en/brauwesen_diplom?ignore_redirection=yes

Were you a graduate of the master brewers diploma program? how long was your stay, what's your name? Is this paul?

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Yes. Lived in Germany 3 years. My name is not Paul.

I've been brewing german wheat beers for more then half your life.

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Congratulations. I've brewed professionally on a 100BBL system four times a week for 5 years prior to starting my own brewery four years ago. Your point?

so you are saying a 10 day old wheat beer isn't green beer as in "not matured yet" (not "green" as not being fermented)? could you tell me how long it would take to properly carbonate/condition 5 gals of hefeweizen 5-5.5% abv to 3.1 volumes after 10 days on the yeast?

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Define mature. As I've stated earlier, it involves mathematics that I won't get into here. It also has nothing to do with ABV. There are a lot of variables that need to be taken into account.