A Strange Darkening

[jzamora3]

I've brewed about 20 batches now and one of my go-to's is a Bavarian hefeweizen.. I've brewed this particular recipe about 3 times using the same process and ingredients, well except the yeast. Along with less than an lb of settling grains, the recipe calls for 6.5lbs for Wheat DME. It also calls for a 90 minute boil. I usually add 1lb for 90 minutes and 5.5lbs at 15 minutes. I did the same last night and the color looked great as I was cooling and aerating. Pitched the yeast (Wyeast 3638) and woke up this morning (7 hours later) to find that my beer has darkened significantly. It looks almost the color of an amber ale. This never happened before. Any ideas what caused this? Might fermentation cause it to lighten up a bit? Thanks!

 

[LLBeanJ]

It will lighten up once the yeast takes off and fermentation begins. What you're seeing now is the natural wort color, which looks darker in bulk than it will in your glass, and sans any yeast in suspension.