Simple Hefeweizen with Banana

I am getting ready to start my third ever batch and I have decided that I want to use a simple hefeweizen extract recipe. On top of the recipe I use, however, I want to add fresh bananas to give it a nice banana flavor. My question is how should I go about adding the bananas (when, how much, ripeness) in order to get the best possible flavor from them.

Sounds like a wonderful brew, I haven't had much luck with fresh fruit so I use flavorings, sorry I'm not much help.

The yeast used to make Hefe will give off banana flavor.

As Logan said those flavors come from the yeast.

Just did a quick search in the recipe database and found this.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f70/kick-you-face-banana-hefeweizen-60754/

Thanks for that link. I'm a pretty big banana fan so I'm not worried about "too much banana" but does the higher temp yeast yield the same flavor that any banana addition will? I might just try both and hope for the best.

I've had some micro brewed heffs that had really nice clove and banana flavors from the yeast alone. Not overly strong but still present. Im not sure if higher temps will produce more of those flavors. Might be worth asking in the yeast forum here.

I think 3068 is the one that gives off banana and clove.

Is it the higher fermentation temp that causes this? Do you have a recommendation for how to increase fermentation temp without actually raising the room temp?

I made a porter with bananas. I blended them and let them soak in some dark rum for a couple on hours. Then racked to secondary. It ended up with a small hint of banana taste and some aroma. Next time I make it I am going to add artificial banana flavoring as well. But because I want more banana taste.

Artificial flavoring was another thought I had. Any idea how much? Would you just add it during the boil?

I have read on here, people say 2oz per 5 gallons(or to taste). I think its a good idea with the bananas cause you don't get the juice like you do from berries. I would guess adding it to secondary or before bottling.

Thanks for all of the help. I'm going to my local homebrew store Friday to get ingredients for a hefe recipe I found on another thread. The plan is to add 3-4 pounds of grilled banana to the primary in a grain bag and then add the artificial flavoring to taste on bottling day.

Awesome! Please let us know how it goes. And what recipe are you going to use or tweak? Link?

It's sort of a mash up of multiple recipes.

3 lbs wheat LME
3 lbs wheat DME
4 oz crystal 20
1 oz hallertau @60 min
White Labs WLP300
5 oz brown sugar for priming

Planning on a minimum of 2 weeks in primary. I don't have another fermenter at this point so secondary is out of the question. Hopefully the fresh bananas will add something to the taste but ill have the extract flavoring to get it where I want it.

Just an update. I brewed Saturday and added the bananas and wort to my carboy. After two days the yeast has gone crazy. I expected this would be the case and I knew that with just a 5 gallon carboy I was in for a mess. I added a blowoff tube once the fermenting got too out of hand so I will probably leave that for another couple days. How much beer can I expect to lose when all is said and done?

I recently did a chocolate banana Stout and added real banana in 2 places.

First I bought some banana chips, 4 lbs, from a heath food store (didnt want a bunch of preservatives) and ground them up in a food processor. Those were added to the mash. No clue what sugars were added there.

Next I added mashed up ripened bananas, apporx 3lbs, mixed with rum infused with vanilla beans to the secondary.

NOW, I do 10 gal batches and my secondaries are spilt up between 2 carboys. I kegged the first carboy after only 7 days in secondary, the babana slurry was still retaining some yellow color but I was excited to see how this worked. The first week of kegged beer was good with a solid aroma of banana and a good amount of chocolate. but as it aged the banana faded and the chocolate took over. My second carboy is scheduled to be kegged and filtered (banana parts everywhere) tonight. Im oping that the 21 day secondary with banana will promote longer banana aroma and flavor. Im still not sure if the dried banana in the mash did much but it sure didnt hurt. Will report tomorrow on the difference.

I thought of using hefe yeast but I really didn't want any clovey flavors in a stout.

I tried the same thing as you for my second-ever brew a few months ago. I had frozen the bananas, blended them with 99 Bananas liquor to sterilize them, then added them to the primary after the initial fermentation had settled down (about 5 days, as I recall). The result was a higher-alcohol, and decent-tasting Hefe, though not specifically to style. But it ended up being much darker than I intended. I was wondering if the banana mush darkened (due to oxidization?) much like bananas do naturally when they ripen. Also, their was only the faintest hint of banana flavor.
If I had to do it again, I would likely add 2 oz of natural banana extract at bottling. (I say 2 oz, because my next one was a pumpkin ale , and I felt that 4oz [for 5 gal] was a bit much). Bananas are really high in sugar, and I bet the yeast will mostly chew them into EtOH.
If you've never had Wells Banana Bread Beer, go obtain some. As far as banana flavor, thats what I'd be shooting for. Great-tasting beer. FWIW, they say they use real bananas as well as banana flavoring, though I've no idea in what context.

None that I noticed. It was actually a little more carbonated than I would want for the style, so next time a little less corn sugar.

It was about that time that I thought I should probably try to get the basic Hefe down before I started adding extras. My last one is bottled and should be ready to try by next week. It tasted pretty good at bottling, so I am looking forward to it.

The one issue I ran into was that I seemed to get a lot lower efficiency on my partial mash than I have with other beers. This seems to happen to others as well; advice I will implement next time is:
1. smaller grind (maybe twice through the mill) with some rice hulls
2. I'm still unsure whether I would need a protein rest for the wheat partial-mash

In the end, although my initial gravity was lower (than predicted on Brewer's Friend), the final gravity was also lower, so the final ABV wasn't much lower than predicted, and ended up holding to style. I'll let you guys know what the final verdict is.