Heffeweizen Time Again

[Barley Water]

I am trying to get ready for our large annual contest here in North Texas in early March and got my last beer brewed, a Heffe on Saturday. I used my standadard formulation, malted wheat/malted barley ratio 70% with 1/2 a pound of light munich and the rest German pils. Santa gave me a new decoction pot for Christmas so I did a double decoction and also boiled down some of the first runnings. Everything worked out well and I hit my O.G. target of 1.052 spot on with the desired volume, life is good. My usual routine is to pitch one tube of WLP300, no starter and no wort oxigenation so as to entice the yeast to give me the maximum esters and phenols. This time, it took a day and a half to get a good fermentation going, I can't wait to see what nice Christmas presents the WLP300 is going to give me this batch. I am shooting for a fermentation temperature of 68F but I suspect that I may be a little lower than that as it is a little colder brewing in Texas this time of year. I may get more clove that I would like (I usually try to get more bananna than clove which is why I target 68F) but what the hell, it worked out pretty well last year so we will see what happens.

My plan is to naturally carbonate the beer in the keg by adding wheat DME (my feable attempt at a poor man's krausen). All I have to do then is shake up the keg once in a while to get the yeast back into suspension since I think heffe is better with yeast chunks in the glass. Since I have to enter three 12oz bottles for competition, I usually just fill the bottle right out of the keg, cap them and warm condition them along with the keg. Nothing sucks quite as bad as trying to use a counter pressure filler on highly carbonated wheat beer, you end up wasting a lot of beer and getting very frustrated (and I like my heffe pretty fizzy).

[awalker]

Sounds great.

Does the 70% wheat make a big difference?
As my last wheat I upped it to 60% and it does taste better than a 50% wheat beer.
But seemed to need a bit longer to age before drinking

The plan was to try the 70% next as I also have loads of wheat malt
So interested in you thoughts

[Barley Water]

To tell you the truth, I have pretty much always used 70% wheat malt so I really can't answer your question from experience. When I started doing wheat beers many years ago, I read somewhere that the traditional formulations used 70% so that is what I did. Since I have had pretty good luck, I never saw a reason to change, probably has something to do with getting older maybe? I have read however that once you get over say 50%, it really doesn't make that much difference but of course reading something in a book or magazine and actual practice sometimes vary. By the way, the more wheat you have, the greater the chance for a stuck mash so remember to use rice hulls to help with runoff.

While we are at it, I will pontificate a bit and tell you what in my experince does matter:

This beer is all about the yeast and fermentation. You can get the following flavors so you can pick your poison-bannana, clove, pear, bubblegum, light plumb. The two variables which control this are strain selection and fermentation temperature. I am ususally shooting for something like a Pauliner heffe so I am going for bananna and clove (and I try to get as much bananna as I can). To do this, I like WLP300 and I ferment at about 68F. If you want more clove there are two things you can do, ferment lower maybe about 64-65F and do a quick protein rest at around 110F when mashing. Note of caution, I have had trouble with head retention doing protein rests so I don't do them anymore. Also, if you go higher than 68F you risk throwing off fussel alcohols which will adversly affect the taste of the beer. A buddy of mine in the brewclub has messed around with multiple strains to get some of the bubblegum also. I really like the beer but for some reason it doesn't do as well in competitions, seems folks think that only bananna and clove are acceptable, go figure? I guess at the end of the day, the lession is that if you can't control fermentation temperatures, it is really hard to make a good example of this style (unless you get lucky and the weather cooperates).

The other thing I learned over the years is that (and I know this will start an argument) doing a decoction will improve your beer. I am sure that you can mimic the taste by adjusting the grain bill a little (add more Munich malt or whatever) but there is no way I know of to affect the mouthfeel like doing a decoction. It will make the beer seem just a little smoother and a little creamy, very nice. Over here, this is a fairly popular style in competitions because it is not that hard to make a passable example. I know for a fact that the guys that won metals with this style in the big contests last year all did decoctions. Of course competitions are in many respects just a "crap shoot" but I don't think this is just a random observation, there is some causation at work here.

The other two things I like to do with this style may or may not make a difference but I like to think it helps. First of all, I like to try a stress the yeast a little by underpitching and not aerating the wort. I am trying to get the yeast into the growth phase which should lead to more fermentation by products. I figure, if this technique works for monks in Belgium, it should work for me, right? Secondly, I like to naturally carbonate the beer since I want just a little more yeast in the keg or bottle. I use wheat DME to do this and I like to make the beer pretty fizzy so it makes bottling easier. I usually keg the stuff but I will do a few bottles for competitions and I want some yeast in every bottle, just like the Germans do. Anyway, I hope all this helps you make some great wheat beer, let me know of any little tricks you pick up while working with this style, one of my favorites.

[oblivious]

Good luck with it Barley Water

[awalker]

To tell you the truth, I have pretty much always used 70% wheat malt so I really can't answer your question from experience. When I started doing wheat beers many years ago, I read somewhere that the traditional formulations used 70% so that is what I did. Since I have had pretty good luck, I never saw a reason to change, probably has something to do with getting older maybe? I have read however that once you get over say 50%, it really doesn't make that much difference but of course reading something in a book or magazine and actual practice sometimes vary. By the way, the more wheat you have, the greater the chance for a stuck mash so remember to use rice hulls to help with runoff.

I used to use rice hulls but since raisiing the mash temp at the end my mash tun always seems to play ball. Even with the 60% wheat beer I did before xmas.
The reason I started upping the wheat mash is like you said, I have read that some of the brewerys use 80%. Not sure I am that brave.

This beer is all about the yeast and fermentation. You can get the following flavors so you can pick your poison-bannana, clove, pear, bubblegum, light plumb. The two variables which control this are strain selection and fermentation temperature. I am ususally shooting for something like a Pauliner heffe so I am going for bananna and clove (and I try to get as much bananna as I can). To do this, I like WLP300 and I ferment at about 68F.

Lately I have been doing ferments at 17oC (62F) due to reading about what Jamil from Brewing Classic Styles said but did the last at 20oc (68F) and it was much better.

[/quote]
The other thing I learned over the years is that (and I know this will start an argument) doing a decoction will improve your beer. I am sure that you can mimic the taste by adjusting the grain bill a little (add more Munich malt or whatever) but there is no way I know of to affect the mouthfeel like doing a decoction. It will make the beer seem just a little smoother and a little creamy, very nice. Over here, this is a fairly popular style in competitions because it is not that hard to make a passable example. I know for a fact that the guys that won metals with this style in the big contests last year all did decoctions. Of course competitions are in many respects just a "crap shoot" but I don't think this is just a random observation, there is some causation at work here.
[/quote]
Must admit never have done a decoction yet
But if it makes the end result better it must be worth it.

The other two things I like to do with this style may or may not make a difference but I like to think it helps. First of all, I like to try a stress the yeast a little by underpitching and not aerating the wort.

I always underpitch my yeast, but I reckon thats more just cos I am tight with my money.
Thanks for the advice
I will put it in to practice soon on another batch

Good luck with the beer and the comp

[clogwog]

I agree with Barley Water about his comments on decoctions for wheat beers.

I brewed a dunkelweizen on New Year's day, and this is my mash schedule:

Dough in at 52ºC
Immediately pull a thick decoction, and slowly raise to 66ºC. Hold for 15 min then boil for 10.
Add back to main mash, and adjust temperature to 63ºC, and rest for 30 minutes.
Pull a thin decoction (liquid only) and bring straight to the boil.
Add this back in, and adjust to 71ºC and rest for about 15 minutes.
Sparge as normal.

This adds a deep maltiness to the beer, with it still being crisp and refreshing, and with a deep saturated colour.