Weiss The Flock - Hefeweizen

Alastair70 · Aug 16, 2022

This one is destined for BrewCon in October. The grain bill, mash and fermentation are based on the Jamil Zainasheff recipe from Brewing Classic Styles, but I fancied Tettnang for the hop instead of magnum/Saaz or whatever it was he used.

Balanced Water Profile

Fermentables
2.5kg Wheat malt
2kg Bohemian Pilsner
500g Vienna Malt
300g Torrified wheat

Mash Steps
Ferulic Acid Rest - 43C 20 minutes
Conversion rest - 65C 40 minutes
Mash out - 75C 10 minutes

Hops
Tettnang 14g 60min
Tettnang 7g 30min

Yeast
WLP300 - Hefeweizen yeast

Fermentation
14 days at 17C

According to JZ keeping fermentation temp at 17C is the key to making a prize winner, so here goes!

20L in FV at 1.054. IBU 11.5, EBC 7

Baldbrewer · Aug 16, 2022

good luck I'm sure it will be a cracker!

have you tried the WLP380 yeast? makes a lovely wheat beer if you like a bit more clove/banana balanced flavour.
look forward to hearing how you get on thumb.

Alastair70 · Aug 16, 2022

Baldbrewer said:
good luck I'm sure it will be a cracker!

have you tried the WLP380 yeast? makes a lovely wheat beer if you like a bit more clove/banana balanced flavour.
look forward to hearing how you get on

I used WLP380 once and got banana overload. It was a weizenbock so no harm done, but I wouldn't want that much in a hefe. The fermentation ran warm which undoubtedly pushed ester production.
My go to for wheat beer is Wyeast Weihenstephen and I think WLP300 is the same or similar. At least I can control fermentation temp properly now and can have a couple of runs at different temp profiles over the next few brews.

Alastair70 · Aug 25, 2022

Fermentation is done, finished out at 1.010 for a very respectable ABV of 5.8%. I think I'll be sticking with the 17C fermentation going forward, there's plenty of ester character in the swig from the trial jar but not too much to overpower. Cant wait to see what it's like when it's conditioned.

SMP Brewery · Dec 19, 2022

A bit late asking and I’ve read there are issues getting feedback. How did this turn out?

Alastair70 · Dec 19, 2022

Fair to middling. I scored 33 which I think was reasonable.
The judges thought it was slightly dark for style (I didn’t agree with that) and criticised the lack of yeast esters (I brewed it that way).
I wasn’t happy with head retention, and I’ve learned that I like a bit of banana in my wheat beers. I’ll be keeping the fermentation temp at 17 for 2-3 days on the next brew then letting it free climb for the remainder.