Hefeweizen hop and (old) yeast questions

[dufresne]

Going to be brewing a hefe soon and wondering about hops. I've got 100g of Hallertau (1.7% AA) and 100g of Herkules (17.3% AA). I know I should use the Hallertau, but at that low AA will have to use a lot, like 70g. Been reading about the Herk and I like sound of the flavour profile, black pepper and mellon.

To play it safe I could use the Hallertau, or use very small amount of the Herk (Herkweizen???) :) Anyone got any advice or recommendations?

Secondly, I found a jar of yeast at the back of my fridge. A 3068 I use to brew a hefe about a year ago! I recovered yeast from the fv, washed and split into a few jars. The jars I used worked great, but it's been a while, is it dead? Should I try to revive it and maybe use for an apfelwein?

 

[TheRedDarren]

Hey fella,
If you're going to use the hops as a bittering addition, use the higher alpha ones, its more cost effective.
As for the yeast, if its a year old you may have lost it, but knock up a 1l starter @1.030 ono and see how she goes.

 

[dufresne]

Cheers Darren, I'll use the Herk for bittering, I'll only need ~8g!

It's worth trying to rouse the yeast, nothing to lose I suppose.

 

[MyQul]

Don't know about the Hefeweizen but as for the yeast, I'd go even more gently than Darrens suggestion.

I'd sort of treat it like culturing up yeast from a bottle conditoned beer and do something along these lines:

I'd firstly just 'wake up the yeast' with a 250ml-500ml (depending on how much yeast you've got) 1.020 starter ferment it out then add another 250ml-500ml of 1.020. Then do a 1L 1.040 then a 2L 1.040.

 

[TheRedDarren]

Don't know about the Hefeweizen but as for the yeast, I'd go even more gently than Darrens suggestion.

I'd sort of treat it like culturing up yeast from a bottle conditoned beer and do something along these lines:

I'd firstly just 'wake up the yeast' with a 250ml-500ml (depending on how much yeast you've got) 1.020 starter ferment it out then add another 250ml-500ml of 1.020. Then do a 1L 1.040 then a 2L 1.040.

Yep, agree with that :thumb:

 

[dufresne]

Got a couple of Belgian bottles here I want to harvest yeast from (St Bernadus ABT12 & Quintine Bio Organic) So will do them and the 3068 at the same time.

Thanks again for the top advice folks.

 

[MyQul]

Got a couple of Belgian bottles here I want to harvest yeast from (St Bernadus ABT12 & Quintine Bio Organic) So will do them and the 3068 at the same time.

Thanks again for the top advice folks.

You could do worse than have a look at my bottle culturing guide:

http://www.thehomebrewforum.co.uk/showthread.php?t=53567