First Dunkelweizen

decided to branch out from my basica Hefe's and try something a bit new
have a bit of 3068 washed yeast lying around and I love me some german wheat's so though a dunkel was the next logical step

modified in at

6 lbs of Wheat LME
8 ounces of american chocolate malt
4 ounces of Bicsuit
8 ounces of Sugar or Honey (not sure which I'll use) to dry it out a tad

1 oz of Tettnanger hops


use with a starter made from 3068 yeast

OG should be 1.047
FG around 1.012
making it a decent 4.59% session dunkel

hopefully this turns out well

any thoughts on this bad boy?

Its a little weak for a Dunkelweizen, but that's not necesaryily a bad thing.

For my taste, you have too much chocolate in there, and having no crystal and using sugar will make it too thin. DW's should be dry, but not thin. I'd throw in some dark crystal. I like 4-6oz each of C40 and Special B in mine.

This is a beer that shouldn't have any 'roast' character, imho. 8oz of chocolate will start to get roasty, especially with no crystal to cut it.

ghpeel said:

Its a little weak for a Dunkelweizen, but that's not necesaryily a bad thing.

For my taste, you have too much chocolate in there, and having no crystal and using sugar will make it too thin. DW's should be dry, but not thin. I'd throw in some dark crystal. I like 4-6oz each of C40 and Special B in mine.

This is a beer that shouldn't have any 'roast' character, imho. 8oz of chocolate will start to get roasty, especially with no crystal to cut it.

Click to expand...

gotcha, I was adding in more chocolate to get a more choco/banna type mixing, but I'll cut that back a little to not get it over roasted.

since it's my first dunkel I'm re-thinking this recipe and maybe going with deathbrewers partial mash due to it's popularity

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/easy-partial-mash-brewing-pics-75231/index3.html#post788687

I was gonna say, you definitely need some Munich in there! You can't have a dunkelweizen/weizenbock without it IMO. A few ounces of pale chocolate for color and a hint of roast flavor isn't bad.

I usually throw some munich, vienna, and a touch of chocolate wheat in mine. It gives me a great malty backbone, but everyone else is right. You could also consider some special B.

You definitely don't want the roast/coffee flavors in there. They tend to mask the awesome banana/clove esters that make hefes what they are.

FWIW I just brewed this on new year's eve. It's still in the primary so I can't comment on how it came out yet.

Recipe Specs
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Batch Size (G): 6.0
Total Grain (lb): 13.000
Total Hops (oz): 1.00
Original Gravity (OG): 1.058 (°P): 14.3
Colour (SRM): 18.0 (EBC): 35.5
Bitterness (IBU): 12.9 (Average)
Brewhouse Efficiency (%): 72
Boil Time (Minutes): 60

Grain Bill
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7.000 lb Wheat Malt (53.85%)
3.000 lb Pilsner (23.08%)
2.000 lb Munich II (15.38%)
0.500 lb Chocolate, Pale (3.85%)
0.500 lb Special-B (3.85%)

Hop Bill
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1.0 oz Hallertau Tradition Pellet (3.8% Alpha) @ 60 Minutes (Boil) (0.2 oz/Gal)

Misc Bill
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Double decoction: 123 for 45min, 152 for 60min, 168 mashout
Fermented at 67°F with WLP300 - Hefeweizen Ale