3rd batch = German Hefeweizen

With Whitelabs Hefeweizen IV yeast. Will be brewing it tonight if I am not too tired.

Any suggestions, or potential pitfalls?

Thanks!!!

Grain or extract? Recipe???

oh...


6 lbs. wheat malt extract
1/2 lb. wheat malt grain
1/2 lb. six-row pale malt
1/4 lb. cara-pils malt
1 oz. Hallertauer hops (bittering 60 minutes of boil))
3/4 cup corn sugar for priming
White Labs liquid Hefeweizen Yeast
1 pkg. Bru-Vigor (yeast food)
O.G. - 1.046 -- F. G. - 1.011

ahoym8e said:

1/2 lb. six-row pale malt

Click to expand...

If you really want to mash grains, go with 2-row here. The carpils is not necessary either.

Honestly, just the malt extract and the hops will make a great beer. But since I can remember my extract brewing days, where I thought I'm not doing enough if I don't mash/steep grains, I won't vote strongly against the using of the grains here.

But Homebrewer will be able to give you more advice here

Kai

Kaiser said:

Honestly, just the malt extract and the hops will make a great beer. But since I can remember my extract brewing days, where I thought I'm not doing enough if I don't mash/steep grains, I won't vote strongly against the using of the grains here.i

Click to expand...

Yes--my vote for an extract hefeweizen is not specialty grains at all, or steep up to a half pound of munich if you want a slightly maltier flavor (and darker color).

Hefeweizen has got to be just about the easiest style to brew a great extract version of. Super-simple ingredients--the yeast really does all the work. The yeast strains are fairly sensitive to temperature: that's the only tricky part.

I agree with everyone else. Grains are not necessary.

I do a lot of HWs and all I use is DME. Is yours liquid or dry? LIquid is more concentrated than dry, but either way, the 6 lbs will be enough.

What's the hop % AA? 3.8-4.4% should be high enough to balance the sweetness out of the brew a bit.

I use whole hops so I up them to 1.1-1.2 oz (3.5%) for every oz recommended by the recipe. For pellets just use what the recipe calls for.

Other than that I think your brew will be a good one.

I do a lot of "late boils" where I add the majority of the malt after the 45 min boil and boil another 15 mins (to get another hot break). This keeps the carmalization and color down (not as dark as a full 1 hr boil and all the malts).

homebrewer_99 said:

I do a lot of HWs and all I use is DME. Is yours liquid or dry? LIquid is more concentrated than dry, but either way, the 6 lbs will be enough.


I do a lot of "late boils" where I add the majority of the malt after the 45 min boil and boil another 15 mins (to get another hot break). This keeps the carmalization and color down (not as dark as a full 1 hr boil and all the malts).

Click to expand...

Liquid ME.

It feels like I am more of an involved brewer when I steep the grains! lol I know it's all perception.

The "late boil" sounds intriguing. So just boil the hops in 3 gals (I am doing partial boil) for 45 minutes, add the LME, boil another 15 and cool? I don't have any aroma hops, just bittering. This results in a lighter color beer I am guessing?

Thanks for the input everyone.

I will be steeping the grains just to make myself feel important...

I may post some tonight while I am boiling...

Cheers!

Throwing in my two-cents: I just did an all extract Weizen and I was strongly persuaded not to use specialty grains. I, also, did a late boil and I boiled my hallertau at 60 for about 30 minutes and then added my ME. Its been in the bottle for a little over a month and its just starting to taste like a HefeWeizen. I would add a small amount of grains just to add a little complexity to the flavor.

Oh, and props for spending the extra cash for the right yeast. Good call.

Keep an eye on the fermentation temp, too high and you end up with banana beer I think.

I agree with the temp comment.

Make sure you add the lightest malt in the boil...which would be the rice...and the hops.

homebrewer_99 said:

which would be the rice.

Click to expand...

rice ? there ain't no rice in German beers. And you should know that

Kai

so does a late add of extract do anything with the alpha acid ustilization rates? just wondering, its a good idea.

drengel said:

so does a late add of extract do anything with the alpha acid ustilization rates? just wondering, its a good idea.

Click to expand...

It does. But none of the programs I know account for that. If you are worried, you can use the average of the wort's gravity to calculate your IBUs.

Kai

average between the wort with a little dme in it and the wort with all of the dme in?

drengel said:

average between the wort with a little dme in it and the wort with all of the dme in?

Click to expand...

If you want to be exact, go with a weighted average. But in the end, it won't make much of a difference anyway since there are so many other factors that affect hop utilization that we don't even consider.

Kai

You can always try 5 lbs of wheat like I just attempted.... I still have some hair left and the stutter is actually starting to improve.....

(just to be sure.....I'm joking by the way.....don't even think of it :fro: )

homebrewer_99 said:

I do a lot of HWs and all I use is DME. Is yours liquid or dry? LIquid is more concentrated than dry, but either way, the 6 lbs will be enough.

Click to expand...

Ehh, isn't it just the opposite.....DME is more concentrated than LME?

Anyway, I agree with the late extract addition. Maybe 50% toward the beginning of the boil, for hop utilization, then stagger the rest toward the end of the boil. Your hop utilization might not be optimal, but should be fine for a beer in this style. It'll minimize carmelization, and help keep the color lighter.

Best of luck....a good hefe is a thing of beauty!

According to a chart I picked up sometime ago the relationship is:

1 lb grain equals 0.75 lb LME equals 0.6 DME

What I was trying to point out (because we didn't know if his recipe is LME or DME) was that 6 lbs of LME equals about 4.8 lbs DME.

So DME is more concentrated and I misspoke. Thanks for catching that.

Here is my input.

I did a late extract addition. I boiled the inital mash (I steeped some grain) and hops for 30 minutes, and then at the 30 minute mark added the LME. It took quite a bit of stirring to get it to dissolve completely, but anyway.

I am a little nervous becasue it took like 20 minutes for me to resume full rolling boil. I shut down after1 hour though, since I didn't want to overboil my hops.

So now the question is, does it matter that the LME and hops only boiled "togehter" for maybe 10-15 minutes?


I let the wort sit in my bottling bucket for a few hours, and much of my cold break settled towards the bottom third of the bucket. When I then transferred to my fermnter, all the coagluate just came out of the spigot, so the first third of the transfer was all muddy, but the last half or so was the most beautiful clear amber. Since anll the hops, etc had flowed into my fermenter form the spigot anyay, I decided to pour allmost everything into it.

I put the Hefeweizen yeast and Brew vigor in, and put my fermenter in a big tub of water upstairs (with a couple of ice blocks to keep fermenting temps around 68-72.

I checked this am, and it is fermenting vigorously. My airlock is almost boiling! The airlock smells somewhat what I expect th final product to smell like.

anyway, just my update...

I was in a brewpub in Glasgow yesterday and they did an excellent HefeWeizen. They used Perle hops, which I think i'll try when I do my next batch. Anyone else use Perle? I can't remember if he said he used them in the Hefe or the lagers, I was a bit wasted by this time.

wow, it was the most active fermentation I've ever witnessed. my airlock was in a rolling boil for like a day and a half.

now (3rd day in fermenter I am getting one little glurk every 20 -30 seconds).

My koelsh yeast slowly bubbled away for like 10 days, but this whitelabs Hefeweizen IV really took off. the whole room where my fermenter is smells like fermentation from all the gasses that were pouring out of the airlock

anyway, lets hope its a good one.

Wow gents I an so excited reading all these hefe posts. My first order of beer supplies came through today and I can barely wait to start brewing this week end. Im doing a LME
hefe batch with a liquid yeast and some specialty grain in the mix for good measure should be interseting. Cheers.

mysterio said:

I was in a brewpub in Glasgow yesterday and they did an excellent HefeWeizen.

Click to expand...

Apologies for hijacking the thread, we'll be visiting Glasgow and area next month and want to sample the local brewpubs. Can you recommend a few?
Thanks and we now return to your regularly scheduled program.

Kaiser said:

rice ? there ain't no rice in German beers. And you should know that Kai

Click to expand...

Yes, I do...we all know that's what makes German beer so good... .

I only mentioned using rice because he was concerned about the color of his brew. If you look at the Weihenstephan recipe in Beer Captured they mention using rice in the all-grain recipe.

Any way, I should have done a "quote" reply.

Later...

Hey gents is my 60 degree basement too cold to do a hefeweizen?

I would say "yes", but you can always move it closer to the furnace (if running) or the water heater. Place a thermometer on top of the fermenter so you know what the outside temp is. If it's too high then you can slide the fermenter away from the heater.

You want the temp to be around 70F.

Mikey said:

Apologies for hijacking the thread, we'll be visiting Glasgow and area next month and want to sample the local brewpubs. Can you recommend a few?

Click to expand...

Yeah, check out West on Glasgow Green. Excellent German themed brewpub with great schnitzels. Theres also Clockwork in Cathcart (south side) but thats a little off the beaten track. They brew some good ales and have a nice selection of malt whiskys. City center wise, try the Bier Halle on Gordon Street. Not a brewpub but they do have a selection of about 200 imported beers.

mysterio said:

Yeah, check out West on Glasgow Green. Excellent German themed brewpub with great schnitzels. Theres also Clockwork in Cathcart (south side) but thats a little off the beaten track. They brew some good ales and have a nice selection of malt whiskys. City center wise, try the Bier Halle on Gordon Street. Not a brewpub but they do have a selection of about 200 imported beers.

Click to expand...

cheers!

This is the heffe that I brewed and it came out very good.

6.60 lb Wheat Liquid Extract (10.0 SRM) Extract 100.0 %
0.75 oz Hallertauer [3.20%] (60 min) Hops 6.4 IBU
0.69 oz Hallertauer [3.20%] (30 min) Hops 4.5 IBU
1 Pkgs Weihenstephan Weizen (Wyeast Labs #3068) Yeast-Wheat

It fermented at about 68deg.

Nice job, Brewby. Looks great.

Yeah looks great. I cant wait til my hefe is done!

Nice one brewby. How long did you leave it in the bottle? Did you do any cold conditioning?