Hefeweizen yeast

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Grealish

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I am going to brew a banana heavy beer with WLP300. James Morton reckons over pitch for banana, under pitch for clove but every other opinion I’ve read says under pitch for banana… does anyone know the definitive answer?
 
I can't give you a definitive answer, but anecdotally, I pitched about half to two thirds of a pack of Wyeast Weihanstephaner 3068(IIRC) and it was gloriously banana-ish.
 
Banana is an ester, clove is a phenol. Under pitch for esters, over pitch for phenols.

I recently brewed a banana forward wheat beer and it turned out a banana bomb. Here's how I did it:

Pitched at 20C and let rise naturally to 23.5C and held it there for remainder of fermentation.

Under pitched 3/4 of a pack of WYeast 3638.

Open fermented to promote esters (covered with cheesecloth to keep any bugs out, although it was also in the fridge).

Recipe was 66% wheat malt and the rest pilsner malt. I also did a triple decoction mash to get a bit of caramilisation and colour, and help with head retention.

Hope this helps, happy to answer questions.
 
Banana is an ester, clove is a phenol. Under pitch for esters, over pitch for phenols.

That's the conventional wisdom, but it's rather more complicated than that. You just get different esters - there's a nice Powerpoint kicking round the web from a conference a few years ago (I want to say Down Under?) where they showed how the ester profile changed with pitch rates. some go up and some go down. But in this particular case, going low for banana is a reasonable rule of thumb.
 
Banana is an ester, clove is a phenol. Under pitch for esters, over pitch for phenols.

I recently brewed a banana forward wheat beer and it turned out a banana bomb. Here's how I did it:

Pitched at 20C and let rise naturally to 23.5C and held it there for remainder of fermentation.

Under pitched 3/4 of a pack of WYeast 3638.

Open fermented to promote esters (covered with cheesecloth to keep any bugs out, although it was also in the fridge).

Recipe was 66% wheat malt and the rest pilsner malt. I also did a triple decoction mash to get a bit of caramilisation and colour, and help with head retention.

Hope this helps, happy to answer questions.
I also brewed one recently along quite similar lines to this except I did a step mash. I used WY3068.

Also give this article a good read - if anyone knows how to make a hefeweizen it's the Germans 👍🍻
 
I under pitched slightly into a Weizenbock and it smelt very banana ish when I kegged it. I used about 100ml of harvested yeast the next day in a Hefeweizen... I'll see how that goes.
 

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