Hefe question.

Homebrew Talk

Help Support Homebrew Talk:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

brechbräu

Supporting Member
HBT Supporter
Joined
Dec 31, 2024
Messages
36
Reaction score
24
Location
Manheim, PA USA
I’d like to try and brew an all-grain hefe but most of the recipes seem to use a decoction mash or several rests, but which I’m not really set up for… is there something in the wheat compounds that precludes a single infusion mash? I suppose I could start with just a really thick mash and continue adding water to adjust the temperature for the different rests, unless gelatinization would be an issue…

Any thoughts or advice are appreciated!

Thank so much!
 
Just do a 68c rest, use a good yeast, for example lallemand Munich classic, and you're good. Everything else is for fine tuning certain characters.

Btw. Infusion mash steps can be done with almost every setup I know of.
 
Wheat has no husk so you cannot use its husk for filtering when you drain the mash like you can with barley. Add some rice hulls to replace the missing husk for filtering. Otherwise, wheat does just fine in a normal mash.
 
fwiw, my wheat beers are roughly 50/50 barley/wheat. For the ten gallon batches I do I use a half pound of rice hulls, pre-soaked and drained then layered evenly atop the false bottom in my MLT, with the grist dumped on top of that. As long as I start slow and sneak up on the recirculation rate I never get a stuck mash...

Cheers!
 
60 minute mash or longer?
The best way to determine if your mash is done, is to measure the SG of the wort in the mash (after aggressive stirring or recirculation, to insure that everything is homogenized.) Start measuring SG when you think that you are close to being done with conversion. Then measure every 15 minutes, until the SG does not change from one reading to the next. This method is much more accurate than the often recommended iodine test (I can explain why if you are interested.)

Brew on :mug:
 
is there something in the wheat compounds that precludes a single infusion mash?
The theoretical answer to this is “yes”: ferulic acid. This compound is bound up in the cell walls, but a low-temperature (40-50 C) rest activates the enzyme to break it free. Weizen (or any POF+ yeast) will then convert the ferulic acid to 4VG — the clove flavor you’re looking for in a hefeweizen — during fermentation. So in theory, the ferulic acid rest will lead to more clove flavor in the finished beer.

Theory aside, you can get plenty of clove using a single infusion. Brulosophy (for what it’s worth) describes a side-by-side comparison where their tasters couldn’t tell the difference between the two beers.

I’ve found Hefeweizen to be a difficult beer to brew, and I’ve yet to make one I’m completely happy with. But I doubt that skipping the ferulic acid rest is the reason.

If you’re using a dry yeast, my current front-runner is Fermentis’s new W68.

Go for it. It always makes sense to try the simplest approach, and then only add complexity to your process in subsequent batches to achieve specific ends.
 
I was stationed in Germany for nine years and drank way more than my fair share of Hefeweizen. Tried for years to brew one using all the mash schedules and yeast pitch rates and temperature with mediocre results. Then I finally nailed it, brewed a Hefeweizen that rivals most of those I drank in Germany.

55%wheat
40% pils, pale malt will work
5% carapils

Mash @ 152F
Boil 60 minutes with one ounce of hallertau or tettnang hops

Ferment @ 68F with Lallemand Munich Classic dry yeast

Bottle to 3 volumes CO2. Do not keg, the yeast will settle out, you want that yeasty goodness in your Hefeweizen when you drink it.

I took some to my drinking buddy, he took a drink and said “now THATS the taste I’ve been missing.”

Note: I open ferment in a 15 gallon sterilite container from Walmart. You want a shallow fermenter so the CO2 being released doesn’t take away a lot of the aroma.
 
Bottle to 3 volumes CO2. Do not keg, the yeast will settle out, you want that yeasty goodness in your Hefeweizen when you drink it.
Bottle — this is an interesting idea, and I may need to try it.

That said, don’t bottle to 3 volumes unless you have special bottles that you know can handle it. I may have to pick up some more EZ-Caps for this…
 
The theoretical answer to this is “yes”: ferulic acid. This compound is bound up in the cell walls, but a low-temperature (40-50 C) rest activates the enzyme to break it free. Weizen (or any POF+ yeast) will then convert the ferulic acid to 4VG — the clove flavor you’re looking for in a hefeweizen — during fermentation. So in theory, the ferulic acid rest will lead to more clove flavor in the finished beer.

Theory aside, you can get plenty of clove using a single infusion. Brulosophy (for what it’s worth) describes a side-by-side comparison where their tasters couldn’t tell the difference between the two beers.

I’ve found Hefeweizen to be a difficult beer to brew, and I’ve yet to make one I’m completely happy with. But I doubt that skipping the ferulic acid rest is the reason.

If you’re using a dry yeast, my current front-runner is Fermentis’s new W68.

Go for it. It always makes sense to try the simplest approach, and then only add complexity to your process in subsequent batches to achieve specific ends.

Bottle — this is an interesting idea, and I may need to try it.

That said, don’t bottle to 3 volumes unless you have special bottles that you know can handle it. I may have to pick up some more EZ-Caps for this…
That’s how the Germans do it. Pour most of the bottle then swirl the yeast and pour it in. Yummy!

I brewed a Hefeweizen to take camping. Bottled it in German bottles and many “thin” American bottles. Stored them in the bathtub of my camper just in case. Drove six hours in 100f heat over some rough roads and didn’t lose a bottle. Glass is tougher than people think. But

Anyway, I brought over 20 racks of German bottles home with me.
 
I like my hefes to have a strong banana flavor, so I severely underpitch and put it in the warmest spot in the house. It gets done in a couple days and I end up with a banana flavored hefe.
 
Glass is tougher than people think.
Pressurized gases store more energy than people think.

And eyeballs are not as tough as people think.

More seriously, whatever works for you is of course fine, but I feel like if I’m addressing the World of the Internet, I need to err on the side of caution and avoiding bottle explosions.

Always check the ratings before you pressure anything. (Also note that a pressure rating does not mean something can be safely evacuated, and vice versa.)
 
I’ve been brewing Weizen since ‘96 when I started brewing. I’ve never infusion mashed one, I’ve always at least single decocted. You can certainly infusion mashed it. I like to split my barley malt (45% of the grain bill) 50/50 between German Pilsner and light Munich. Sometimes a quarter pound of Cara-Wheat for a bit more character.

Ditto on fermenting in open shallow tubs, like SFC Rudy does. I cover mine with foil and the estery brightness of the beer really comes through. WLP-351 is my favorite Hefe Weizen Yeast.
 
Back
Top