Weissbier Bee Cave Brewery Bavarian Hefeweizen

[DrinkNoH2O]

I cracked one of these open last night after about 2 weeks in the bottle. Fantastic - my best hefe yet.

 

[IPAAAA]

Mine is getting close to testing time. I can't wait.

 

[KeithMoonsLiver]

I cracked one of these open last night after about 2 weeks in the bottle. Fantastic - my best hefe yet.

Any pics? Looking to make this but also going to replace some of the pils with munich malt. Enough to get it to 5-6 SRM.

 

[EdWort]

Subbing American wheat malt for German is not going to affect this recipe at all. Might change the color and malt profile just a hair but unless you did a side by side comparison you wouldn't notice the difference.

Yep, I've made this recipe using Canada Malt Pilsner & Wheat malt and it turned out very good too. The big key is fermenting temps and Weihenstephen German Hefeweizen yeast.

 

[IPAAAA]

I think I fermented too cool at around 68. Don't seem to have a lot of banana flavor or clove. Kinda seems watered down is the best way I could put it.

 

[EdWort]

I think I fermented too cool at around 68. Don't seem to have a lot of banana flavor or clove. Kinda seems watered down is the best way I could put it.

Actually, that's the perfect temp. Did you use Wyeast 3068?

 

[IPAAAA]

Yup. I was expecting umm I guess a thicker mouth feel if that makes sense. t is still very good but maybe I just havent had a commercial hef lately so I could tell the difference.

 

[Chriselv]

I brewed this recipe a while back using the 3056 yeast. It came out REALLY well. It is a beer that everybody seem to like, even the pilsner-only drinkers!

I'm brewing a new hefe tomorrow, with the 3068 yeast, hoping to get a bit more clove and banana taste.

So, my question is, what do you guys think about adding 1 % chocolate malt and about 7 % munchener (replacing a bit of the pilsner malt)? I'm also going to try a mash schedule similar to what they do at Schneider, only with infusion, not decoction.

 

[RobBug]

Thanks for the recipe - it is now a staple beer in my kegerator for SWMBO.

Grain to glass in less than a month. I personally do not enjoy some of the flavors in a true Hefe. I thank you Ed for bringing that to the table because most "Hefes" in the supermarket are really just American Wheat beers as far as I can tell.

The important thing though is my wife loves it. She adds a bit of raspberry syrup to hers (OMG!! WTH!!) and thoroughly enjoys the dance of malt and fruit with a touch (smitdgen) of hops.

 

[NoCornOrRice]

Why is it that almost everything I have read on homebrewing the Hefe style indicates it peaks in drinkability quickly (about 3 weeks from brew day) and then goes downhill? I usually find the 2 month mark to be ideal taste-wise for most of my standard (5-6%abv) beers. I kegged the recipe at the start of this thread (change being I used WB-06 yeast from Fermentis) after letting in sit in primary for 2 weeks, set at 14psi, 40F and served a week later.

It was horrid. I had all but decided that my taste buds were not compatible with the style, and was preparing to give away the keg. I just tried it again (6 weeks from brew day), and I think it is great. Good thing too, since I have another 40 pounds of wheat to use up.

I am virtually certain there was no brewing flaw or infection, and other brewers who tried it concur. So why on Earth would my brewing books say the pinnacle of taste is three weeks from brew day?

Now its actually so good I'll make it again, but 2 weeks ago, I was thinking of it as destined for the drain.

 

[as_saturn_ascends]

Hey Ed, I have been searching for this online for about an 90 min so i thought i would ask the expert. What is the difference between using wheat berries and wheat malt? Is the wheat malt easily converted and the berries not so much? I use wheat berries as an adjunct in a beer of mine and love the nice wheaty taste they lend. what would happen if i used unmalted wheat?

 

[doctorRobert]

Yup. I was expecting umm I guess a thicker mouth feel if that makes sense. t is still very good but maybe I just havent had a commercial hef lately so I could tell the difference.

Did you do a decoction? My hefe's lack the samething. I'm going to start adding munich malt or melanoidin malt to add to the body a bit.

 

[Swig_A_Bedder_Brew]

We brewed this yesterday and over achieved our efficiency. Hit 80% for the first time! Looking forward to seeing how it turns out with a higher ABV. Had an OG of 1062. Notes to come later. Thanks for the recipe.

 

[SteveSD]

I brewed this on Sat 1/29 but used WLP380 Hefeweisen IV yeast instead of the WLP300; I've gotten less "banana bomb" when I used 380 in the past. This is about my 8th all-grain batch, and I've been getting lower OG than expected when grinding my grains at the LHBS, so this time I sent the grains through their mill twice. I did use rice hulls to avoid a stuck sparge. My OG came in at 1.060, higher than expected. I put 5.25 gallons (including starter) in the carboy, then put the carboy in the ferm chamber at 68 degrees. I did use a blowoff tube instead of an airlock.

Yesterday morning there was a pretty thick layer of trub at the bottom of the carboy (maybe as much as 1/2 gallon), and only a thin layer of krausen on top. Temp of the carboy was at 68. I was at work for 24 hours so did not check again until today. This morning there is so much blowoff that probably a pint of wort/beer went into the blowoff pitcher, and the carboy temp now reads at 72. All the trub is just churned into the beer (this is my first batch in a carboy instead of a bucket so I never got to see that before).

My questions:

Given that the endothermic activity of the fermentation has increased the temp of my carboy, am I going to get too much ester production?

Is there any way to end up with 5 gallons of beer with this recipe? Seems like by the time it's done fermenting and the trub resettles I will have only about 4 1/2 to 4 3/4 gallons to go into the keg. I used a 6 gallon carboy but seems like more wort would just mean an even messier blowoff.

Will I still be able to wash and harvest my yeast with so much trub? I've reused this yeast before, but that was with an extract batch using hopped extract, so I had no hop pellet residue or other trub to deal with.

Thanks in advance for any info.

 

[doctorRobert]

I brewed this on Sat 1/29 but used WLP380 Hefeweisen IV yeast instead of the WLP300; I've gotten less "banana bomb" when I used 380 in the past. This is about my 8th all-grain batch, and I've been getting lower OG than expected when grinding my grains at the LHBS, so this time I sent the grains through their mill twice. I did use rice hulls to avoid a stuck sparge. My OG came in at 1.060, higher than expected. I put 5.25 gallons (including starter) in the carboy, then put the carboy in the ferm chamber at 68 degrees. I did use a blowoff tube instead of an airlock.

Yesterday morning there was a pretty thick layer of trub at the bottom of the carboy (maybe as much as 1/2 gallon), and only a thin layer of krausen on top. Temp of the carboy was at 68. I was at work for 24 hours so did not check again until today. This morning there is so much blowoff that probably a pint of wort/beer went into the blowoff pitcher, and the carboy temp now reads at 72. All the trub is just churned into the beer (this is my first batch in a carboy instead of a bucket so I never got to see that before).

My questions:

Given that the endothermic activity of the fermentation has increased the temp of my carboy, am I going to get too much ester production?

Is there any way to end up with 5 gallons of beer with this recipe? Seems like by the time it's done fermenting and the trub resettles I will have only about 4 1/2 to 4 3/4 gallons to go into the keg. I used a 6 gallon carboy but seems like more wort would just mean an even messier blowoff.

Will I still be able to wash and harvest my yeast with so much trub? I've reused this yeast before, but that was with an extract batch using hopped extract, so I had no hop pellet residue or other trub to deal with.

Thanks in advance for any info.

I don't think 72 is too high, if that's the peak temp. Most bavarian brewers all the wort to heat up like that, from low 60s into 70s. Most ester production should be over.

You can still wash the yeast. Check out the sticky in the yeast forum. However, I don't like repitching hefe yeast, it really loses their ability to produce esters.

I use a bucket for my hefe's, the extra head space helps but you still might need a blow off and shoot for 5.5 gallons to ensure I keg a full batch.

 

[BrewThruYou]

I brewed this yesterday and ran into a few problems. Disclaimer: I used 2-row instead of Pilsen and I milled my own grain (first time ever using my mill). This was also my first wheat all-grain brew.

Here were my issues:
1. Stuck sparge. Used rice hulls but that didn't seem to help.
2. Color was very dull. It looked almost grayish-light brown. I did an extract hefeweizen previously and that looked great. All of my AG brews until this one had great color too.
3. It was VERY cloudy with a lot of particulate matter. I use the stainless steel braid in my MLT. I'm thinking that it let a lot of crap into the wort.

At first, I was thinking that I screwed up milling the wheat malt, but my OG reading was actually higher than anticipated due to better efficiency.

 

[Runyanka]

Brewed 10 gallons of this today! I split it into two different fermenters, left half alone, and the other half has some peeled mandrin oranges! Hope they both turn out great. My OG was a little lower than the original recipe, as I upped the amount of wort (to account for loss due to oranges in fermenter), but didn't adjust the grain bill. It still came out at 1.051!

 

[Swig_A_Bedder_Brew]

Got our gravity down to 1014 after one week in primary. Plan on bottling it this weekend. Tasted pretty good already and can't wait to age it a bit.

 

[bmason1623]

My batch is a little over 3 weeks old and it's ok, not great, just ok. It seems like it's not sweet enough. Lacks banana and clove essence. I think I may have fermented at too low of a temp (low to mid 60s). Anything I can do to make it a little sweeter?

Sent from my SGH-T959 using Home Brew Talk

 

[JMass]

A little off-topic, but I went to the Harpoon Brewery tour in Boston on my brother's 60th birthday last Friday. I've been wanting to go to buy glasses. Turns out they have the best prices on Hefe glasses. I bought 2. They are $8 each. One says Hefeweizen and the other says white beer, but they are the same glass.

Regarding the previous post, I thought you get a sweeter beer by mashing at a higher temp - not so much the fermentation temp. I suppose that you could add sugar or dry malt to make the beer sweeter, but that won't add to the clove or banana taste.

 

[EdWort]

Hey Ed, I have been searching for this online for about an 90 min so i thought i would ask the expert. What is the difference between using wheat berries and wheat malt? Is the wheat malt easily converted and the berries not so much? I use wheat berries as an adjunct in a beer of mine and love the nice wheaty taste they lend. what would happen if i used unmalted wheat?

The wheat berrys are not malted, so trying to get to the sugars will be hard.

I use malted wheat because the starches are now available to be converted to sugars in the mash at the stated temp & time which is the whole reason of using malted grains.

As an adjucnt in small amounts, it looks to add some flavor though, but in a Bavarian Hefe, over 50% of the grist must come from Wheat, brewers use malted wheat for this purpose.

 

[Ceedubya]

Not sure if this has been asked and answered here already (I read most of it) but here goes: I plan to make this as one of my first all grains this month but need to bottle instead of keg. I have the ability to keg, but this one will need to be bottled as it is for a friend and we are brewing and bottling at his house 2 hours away.

anyways, any suggestions for bottling? If I don't want to use corn sugar for priming what are my alternatives? Since there is supposed to be yeast still in suspension, is there danger of of bottle bombs? do you need to cut back on the amount of sugar used for priming? when serving should it be swirled to put some of the yeast back into suspension or will it have enough already?

Don't want to sound stupid, but I have never made this style of beer before and don't want any surprises, especially at my freind's (who also happens ot be my boss) house!!

 

[doctorRobert]

Not sure if this has been asked and answered here already (I read most of it) but here goes: I plan to make this as one of my first all grains this month but need to bottle instead of keg. I have the ability to keg, but this one will need to be bottled as it is for a friend and we are brewing and bottling at his house 2 hours away.

anyways, any suggestions for bottling? If I don't want to use corn sugar for priming what are my alternatives? Since there is supposed to be yeast still in suspension, is there danger of of bottle bombs? do you need to cut back on the amount of sugar used for priming? when serving should it be swirled to put some of the yeast back into suspension or will it have enough already?

Don't want to sound stupid, but I have never made this style of beer before and don't want any surprises, especially at my freind's (who also happens ot be my boss) house!!

If you want to be traditional, brew another batch on bottling day and add some of that wort to your beer at bottling.

Or you could save some wort, and use that.

Or use corn sugar or dme. I think dme would suit you well.

No risk of bottle bombs due to yeast, its the sugar content that's important there.

And yes, serve mit hefe (with yeast)

Good luck!

 

[doctorRobert]

Also you might to use even more sugar to carb as hefe should be carbed higher.

I use beer smith to calculate how much dme to add, and carb to 3 volumes.

 

[Ceedubya]

If you want to be traditional, brew another batch on bottling day and add some of that wort to your beer at bottling.

Or you could save some wort, and use that.

Or use corn sugar or dme. I think dme would suit you well.

No risk of bottle bombs due to yeast, its the sugar content that's important there.

And yes, serve mit hefe (with yeast)

Good luck!

Also you might to use even more sugar to carb as hefe should be carbed higher.

I use beer smith to calculate how much dme to add, and carb to 3 volumes.

Thanks! I think I will go the DME route, as I will have extra on hand anyways. I plan to take plenty of pictures, so I'll post them up after brew day.

 

[Hawaiianbrewer]

Brewed this yesterday. For the second time in a row my efficiency was terrible with this brew although better this time. OG around 1.042, however I did end up with a little over 6 gallons. Probably should have boiled a bit longer. No matter, this thing was awesome the first time and it looks damn good right now. Bubbling within 5 hours and 2 inch thick kraus next morning. Rock on, thanks again Ed

 

[andymi86]

For those of you bottling, are you still only fermenting 10 days and crash cooling?

I also got poor efficiency (worse than my normal poor efficiency) , my theory is because the difference in size between the wheat and barley maybe my crush was too coarse. I also mashed for 60 min, so that could have been it too. What is the idea between a 90 minute mash for this recipe? I always thought 60 was fine unless below 150f. Does it have to do with the wheat?

 

[Cubslover]

I want that authentic Banana/Clove Hefe.

Bookmarked. Thanks Ed. I'll use your recipe to the "T"!

 

[cleinen]

Anyone ever try adding any honey malt to this?

 

[Hawaiianbrewer]

Took a sample last night, 7 days old, 1.012 so coming along nicely. To be honest the smell was pretty bad, VERY estery, but the taste was surprisingly smooth with a very pleasant / distinct banana and clove. Fermenting right at 65. I think this will turn out very nice