Weissbier Bee Cave Brewery Bavarian Hefeweizen

[mgortel]

Heya Ed...or anyone else that might be able to answer....

I see in the original recipe post says to ferment at 68F...also, I read that this beer can end up 8-10 F over ambient......sooooooo....my question is this.....what ambient temp should I shoot for in my fermentation chamber.???

I am thinking that maybe I should set it for 65 F to start.....since the yeasties will be bumping up the actual beer temp in the the process by several degrees F.....

Any advice on this is appreciated....as I am brewing this bad boy this Saturday....and i know temperature during fermentation for a Hefe is very important.

 

[ShinyBuddha]

I fermented this @ 69 and got a lot of banana. Used WLP300

 

[mgortel]

Got a question here on this guys:

The hops I got from Northern Brewer are Hopunion "German Tradition"....which are supposed to be their hallertau (or "similar").

They have 6% Alpha......quite a bit higher than the 4-4.5% I was expecting.

Anyway, I know I can plug in the 6% value into Beersmith and adjust the boil time and/or amount of Hops to get in the Correct IBU range.

My question....is it better to keep the same weight of hops and adjust the boil times for each hop addition or is it better to adjust the weight of hops and keep same boil times......OR does it not matter as long as I get the right IBU range and maintain the same ratio of bittering to aroma?

Any thoughts, opinions, experiences?

Thanks!

 

[japhillips87]

Can someone that brewed this tell me if I should use a blowoff for this or is an airlock ok? I remember reading somewhere that Hefs can have some pretty quick fermentation initially.

If I am using an airlock I would just use an Ale Pail for this....
Obviously for a blowoff setup I would use a carboy....



Thanks!

Definitely use a blowoff. The first day I had a half gallon of blowoff come through the tube with a gallon of head space.

 

[japhillips87]

Finally drinking this now. It is an awesome hefe. Flavor is spot on with a hint of banana. I feel that I nailed it especially since this is my first ever brew.
Josh

 

[ShinyBuddha]

...is it better to keep the same weight of hops and adjust the boil times for each hop addition or is it better to adjust the weight of hops and keep same boil times......OR does it not matter as long as I get the right IBU range and maintain the same ratio of bittering...

Just use the IBU range.

 

[Hovik]

I fermented around 64 and did not even come close to needing a blowoff, about 1" of Krausen max...

 

[ShinyBuddha]

Just to update my post from 11-14...after two weeks in the keg banana flavor and aroma has definitely subsided to become more balanced.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Not sure where people are getting that its 5-10 degree's hotter during fermentation?

I have mine in a water bath and with my house set at 62 expecting it to shoot up i woke up with it at 62 and fermenting.

This is with a thermowell directly in the middle of the wort so i know its accurate.

Im now cranking my h ouse up to 70 in hopes i can get it up to 65ish in the next few hours.

 

[mgortel]

That is because you have it in a water bath. Heat transfer rate from your ferm bucket to water surrounding it is much higher than if the bucket was just surrounded by ambient air. If bucket was in 62F ambient air your ferm temp would be higher.

Try taking it out of the water bath....it will heat up. Is it fermenting yet? Fast airlock activity yet?

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Yea its bubbling pretty good right now, i just took it out lets see how it goes.
https://cosm.com/feeds/83208

 

[ShinyBuddha]

Yea its bubbling pretty good right now, i just took it out lets see how it goes.
https://cosm.com/feeds/83208

That's a pretty sweet temp monitoring program you've got there

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Thanks, its only like 40 bucks worth of stuff too lol...30 bucks of Arduino+Ethernet shield off Dealextreme, and 2 DS18B20's for $4/ea.

its worked really good so far at helping me monitor my temps.

 

[mgortel]

Let us know how the temp ends up during peak ferm once you get it out of bath.

ON ANOTHER NOTE.....anyone....I brewed this last Saturday and I know the recipe posted says 2-weeks in primary then keg it...well I bottle....but in any event....I normally let my brews go 3 week min in primary then bottle (as long as SG indicates finish).

Any downside on this brew to let it go another week (i.e. 3 weeks in primary)???? (Other than having to wait another week to drink it... )

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Looks like it came up to 68 with the house set to 66, and is now starting to drop off a bit...i wasnt expecting the water bath to make that much of a difference, but i guess its good to know it does...seems if i set that water to a temp and then my house to near that temp or a bit lower the beer will be stuck there too even during fermentation...

 

[ShinyBuddha]

Any downside on this brew to let it go another week (i.e. 3 weeks in primary)???? (Other than having to wait another week to drink it... )

No downside other than what you mentioned. ;-)

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Wow, this one is stinky. Since this is my "rushed" beer for a party this Sunday and its been 10 days and got down to 1.010 i decided to keg it.
Wow sulfur! Never had really smelled anything like it, the beer itself tastes fine if not a bit young obviously...but the smell..im hoping it dissipates over the next few days before Sunday...or i can see people being turned off when they pour a pint from the keg and it smells like rotten eggs lol.

 

[mgortel]

The recipe calls for 10 days fermentaion. Mine had a vigerous fermentaion, but slowed down. It is now at day 16 and still producing 1 bubble every 6 minutes (It smelled like sulpher at first, but smells great now). I know that the best way to tell if a fermentaion is done is to check the gravity, but common sense is telling me that it is not done. Perhaps is some of the sugar supposed to be retained for flavor by arresting the fermentaion by crash cooling early?
Should I let it go, or should I stop it?

Looks like someone else had a sulpher smell as well at first....but it subsided after waiting.....in the fermenter. Not sure what will happen in your keg.....

Can you purge it with CO2 after it sets in the keg a couple days? Not sure since I dont keg.....

 

[Haputanlas]

Looks like someone else had a sulpher smell as well at first....but it subsided after waiting.....in the fermenter. Not sure what will happen in your keg.....

Can you purge it with CO2 after it sets in the keg a couple days? Not sure since I dont keg.....

I've had massive sulfur come from my fermenter at the beginning as well. For me, it usually goes away in about a week or so.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

Yea the beer looks and tastes good, and there was no sulfur smell coming out of the fermenter as it had finished gasing out.

But when i popped the top that layer of CO2 definately had a stink.

My plan was exactly as you mentioned, to just keep purging it. Every day or so ill just purge the CO2 and let it re-pressurize..since its full at 5 gallons thats barely any gas.
Hopefully that gets some of the sulfur smell out.

 

[mgortel]

So to follow up on this....I brewed this a few weeks ago and plan on botling this Friday (20 days in fermentor).......so what if mine has sulfer smell guys? If I bottle will it settle out in bottle....will it still smell when I pop bottles....anyone that has made this and bottled it....any issues like this??

 

[fatboy34]

I posted a couple months ago regarding a rotten egg problem. I kegged after 10 days with the smell. I then purged and let it sit. I tried purging multiple times a day. It did get better with the smell getting less pungent but after 2 months it never went away. I couldn't drink it without noticing it so I ended up dumping it. Still not sure what happened, infection maybe?

Maybe the key is to keep it in the fermernter until the smell goes away? According to hydrometer it seemed done but...

Was very upsetting but going to brew it again this weekend.

 

[FuzzeWuzze]

That sucks, not what i wanted to hear lol..im hoping mine diminishes but not sounding like it

The beer is actually damn good, im just hoping the smell doesnt turn people off lol....

Im wondering if its because i underpitched?
On a previous batch i did of this for someone it didnt have the smell, but i did a 1L starter with a stir plate for like 36 hours.

For this batch because it was so rushed i just double pitched two packets of the Wyeast....

*edit* Aha...for my batch that didnt stink i used WLP300...this batch i used Wyeast as in the OP....

 

[fatboy34]

Interesting, yeah, sorry. Others did say they had better luck with the smell going away though...for my stinky batch I was rushed and didn't use a starter either. I used Wyeast 3068 for that one but just one pack for 5 gal.

I have a starter going with WL300 for a brew this weekend right now so will see...

 

[MrRoboto]

I just finished my batch of this beer 3 weeks to the day in bottles very tasty but I'm going to try this with some other types of yeast I think this would be better with more of a citrus yeast

 

[dietz31684]

I posted a couple months ago regarding a rotten egg problem. I kegged after 10 days with the smell. I then purged and let it sit. I tried purging multiple times a day. It did get better with the smell getting less pungent but after 2 months it never went away. I couldn't drink it without noticing it so I ended up dumping it. Still not sure what happened, infection maybe?

Maybe the key is to keep it in the fermernter until the smell goes away? According to hydrometer it seemed done but...

Was very upsetting but going to brew it again this weekend.

This sounds exactly like my experience. Not sure what to do...my yeast, WLP 300, wasn't ultra fresh, but wasn't expired either (5 days before expiration date). I did a 2 step starter with a stir plate and all seemed well. I am afraid to brew it again, maybe try a different yeast or try to get a more fresh vial??

I was thinking possible infection too, but never had one that I'm aware of and my beer is typically great (to me and my friends at least). It's frustrating because it's such an easy recipe...not really sure what could have gone wrong other than bad yeast or an infection.

 

[mgortel]

I just got done bottling this!

In the fermenter for 20 days, here is how my numbers went:
OG = 1.052
FG = 1.011

Was a little worried that I was going to have some sulphur smell when I popped the fermenter lid...based on a couple recent threads....but, to my joy when I popped the lid all I smelled was that familiar Hefeweizen Banana and Clove esters..smells fantastic!

I tasted (drank) the gravity sample I took.....flavors were not as prevalent as I expected.....not bad...but more mild....especially considering the smell. Does this beer flavor strengthen with carbonation and a little age in bottle??

Either way I think this is going to be oh so good in a few weeks once done bottle conditioning

 

[paraordnance]

I just got done bottling this!

In the fermenter for 20 days, here is how my numbers went:
OG = 1.052
FG = 1.011

Was a little worried that I was going to have some sulphur smell when I popped the fermenter lid...based on a couple recent threads....but, to my joy when I popped the lid all I smelled was that familiar Hefeweizen Banana and Clove esters..smells fantastic!

I tasted (drank) the gravity sample I took.....flavors were not as prevalent as I expected.....not bad...but more mild....especially considering the smell. Does this beer flavor strengthen with carbonation and a little age in bottle??

Either way I think this is going to be oh so good in a few weeks once done bottle conditioning

What temp you fermented at? I brewed this recipe first time, pitched on thursday at 60F and kept it at 62-63 F (thermowell). It was 1.016 already today! Cannot wait, taste sample was great, little sulphury on the nose but too early to tell

 

[mgortel]

temp got away from me a little...I actually pitched this one at 63F .....it peaked at 70F for half a day....but I got it back to 68F for the rest of the time.

Seems like the sulpher smell has hung around on a few guys batches after 2 weeks....I let mine go almost 3 weeks and it had no sulpher smaell at that time.

 

[oasisbliss]

how big of a starter should I do on this ?