wheat beer recipe advice

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scruffy dog

wheat beer recipe advice

Post by scruffy dog » Mon Feb 13, 2017 2:34 pm

I was thinking along the lines of -

50% pale ale malt
50% wheat malt

bitter to 20 ibu with hallertau hersbruker 90 mins

would a mash termp of 64C be right?
any recommendations for a yeast variety? would i benefit from a liquid yeast or just use a dried packet?

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Sadfield
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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by Sadfield » Mon Feb 13, 2017 3:51 pm

You'll probably get more refinement from a liquid yeast, but I find Danstar Munich pretty decent for a dry yeast. Although if I recall correctly some Danstar strains may only have enough cells for 10L.

A single infusion mash at 64C will more than suffice, if you don't want to experiment with step mashing.







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TheSumOfAllBeers
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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by TheSumOfAllBeers » Mon Feb 13, 2017 5:33 pm

The dried yeast strains are solid for making wheat beers. I have made great beers with WB06.

An area to research is the clove/banana sweet spot. At a certain point in fermentation e.g. 70% attenuated, play with the temperature to generate those flavours.

Jambo
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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by Jambo » Mon Feb 13, 2017 5:38 pm

WLP300 is the Weihenstephan strain and does what you would expect, particularly when fermented warm.

WLP400 is the Hoegaarden one if that's more your bag. Again - needs to be fermented warm. And you're best without an airlock if you don't want to be cleaning up a big mess :)

I have had true to style results from both of these yeasts so fully recommend them.

Good luck.

dbambrick996
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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by dbambrick996 » Tue Feb 14, 2017 12:21 am

Give mauribrew Weiss dried yeast a try.

I normally use 60% wheat and 40% pilsner. Haven't gone with pale malt yet but plan on giving a go

Ren
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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by Ren » Tue Feb 14, 2017 6:09 am

I would suggest wlp380 (more phenolic) i liked it better than wlp300. People say dry hefeweizen yeasts are not half as good as liquid.

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Kev888
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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by Kev888 » Tue Feb 14, 2017 11:34 am

It partly depends what characteristics are wanted. Dried yeast like WB06 can make good wheat beer and may suit the brewer's preference, but for my taste in the hefeweizen I sometimes make, WLP300 (and wlp380) are markedly superior. WLP300 somewhat under-pitched and combined with a ferulic acid rest really hit the nail for me, achieving the banana flavours I was after.
Kev

scruffy dog

Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by scruffy dog » Tue Feb 14, 2017 12:11 pm

thanks for the advice, i'm going to brew 2 wheat beers over the next 2 weeks using the same recipe but with wlp 380 and the danstar.
the last wheat i made used the mauribrew yeast and i was happy with it but it'll be interesting the same recipe with different yeasts.

i'll certainly be increasing the temperature on day 3 as well to increase flavour.

thank you again

Zapp Brannigan

Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by Zapp Brannigan » Thu Feb 16, 2017 2:31 pm

The recipe will give you a very basic hefeweizen for sure. I'd suggest a couple of tweeks (personal opinion only).

I'd want to add a couple of hundred grams of caramunch at least. I also use melanoidin malt in mine. I tend to go for 60-70 percent wheat and the rest from pale/pilsner/various adjuncts.

Your mash pH is going to be important - pale, wheat and low IBUs wont give you much to mask any flavours you dont want. I aim for about 50ppm Ca and an alkalinity of around 35, and use acid malt to bring the pH to where I want it (5.4). My water is hard and alkaline, so I dilute with RO and then build the salts back to give me the Ca and also bias it in favour of chloride for a more malty character.

I mash my weizens at 68-69, single infusion for one hour, again to favour a malty finish. I then batch sparge.

Liquid yeast is the way to go if you can get it, if not you can make a respectable weizen with some dry strains - Mangrove Jacks M20 is fine at a pinch in my experience.

Lastly, 20 IBU is high for a hefeweizen, right at the limit IMO. I usually do 12ish for a pale weizen and 14-15 for a dunkelweizen.

Sorry if this is a bit of a shotgun full of info to the face, I'm certainly not trying to pick fault with what you're doing or say I know better than anyone else. Hopefully some of it could help you out as you brew more of what is one of my favourite styles.

scruffy dog

Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by scruffy dog » Fri Feb 24, 2017 6:52 pm

so i ended up brewing this -

60% wheat
40% pale malt

4 stage decoction mash with 20 min at each temp.

42, 52, 62, 72 C

2 min boil of mash water at each stage.

wlp 300 been fermenting for 3 days at 20 c, knocked the temp up to 21 c this morning.

the decoction mash was interesting but very tiring (i have multiple sclerosis), won't bother doing it again, i'll just do a 2 stage mash and add some melanoidin malt.
reckon i'll use pilsner malt as well

rowyourboat
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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by rowyourboat » Sun Feb 26, 2017 11:16 pm

Would be interested to know how these turn out.

The WB06 is all I have used (my local shop only stocks dried yeasts) and usually turns out well. German wheat is my go-to recipe to try to fine-tune my brewing techniques as in theory it's very simple but I can't seem to get it consistent yet! Latest attempt was a bit thin as I was using new mash tun and didn't hit my mash temps properly but something to work on for next time.

I found using a pilsner malt gave a very pilsner-y flavour to mine (funny that) and personally prefer to use a pale malt instead.

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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by Barley Water » Tue Feb 28, 2017 4:02 pm

Brewing heffe is big fun and you can also learn a ton about yeast handling. I look at those heffe strains much like Belgian yeasts, they can throw off some wild flavors depending on how they are handled and my go to for beers like this is WLP300. In a nutshell, if you want a banana bomb ferment about 68F, if you want clove and some banana ferment about 62F. Bottom line though, the yeast is extremely sensitive to fermentation temperature variations and the beer will taste very different depending on how you brew it. I tried going hotter than 68F once (because I could I guess) and started picking up some solvent flavors which is no bueno. I personally like a mix of the two so I generally ferment on the cold side (seems to do better in contests also for whatever that is worth). I also like to under pitch and I also don't aerate in an attempt to generate even more yeasty flavors and that seems to work out pretty well. As far a grist goes, I generally go with 70% wheat and I also use some Munich malt along with the pils. For the helles weisbier I would likely not go with any crystal malts as there is plenty of malty sweetness due to the very low hopping however for a dunkel weisbier I probably would go with a bit of caramunich (and I have seen formulations which has some Special B which is going to give you some plumb/raisin flavors). I also always decoct these beers because for some reason that seems to really improve the body of the beer but don't ask me why as I have no clue. Once it starts getting warm here in the Lone Star state I'll for sure whip up another batch. :D
Drinking:Saison (in bottles), Belgian Dubbel (in bottles), Oud Bruin (in bottles), Olde Ale (in bottles),
Abbey Triple (in bottles), Munich Helles, Best Bitter (TT Landlord clone), English IPA
Conditioning: Traditional bock bier, CAP
Fermenting: Munich Dunkel
Next up: Bitter (London Pride like), ESB
So many beers to make, so little time (and cold storage space)

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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by dbambrick996 » Mon Jul 10, 2017 6:55 pm


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Bunglebrewsbeer
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Re: wheat beer recipe advice

Post by Bunglebrewsbeer » Tue Jul 11, 2017 4:29 pm

Never brewed one. But just drank a lot of it on my recent trip to southern Germany. Very nice they are too!


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