Hefeweizen

I've loved hefeweizens ever since I first tried one in Germany. At its best, a hefe is refreshing and thirst-quenching, with lots of yeasty flavors that make it a truly unique beer style. Unfortunately, fresh hefes are hard to find in the US. Most American breweries make American-style wheat beers, which I find too lemony and hoppy. There are some good examples: Penn Brewery's Weizen and Lone Rider's Shotgun Betty are about as good as you'll get outside of Bavaria. Of course you can try a German hefe, but they are often a little old by the time they cross the pond and have lost some of the freshness that is a hallmark of this style. I have brewed a couple of extract hefes and was not happy with the results. One reason I switched to all-grain brewing was so I could finally try to make an authentic German hefeweizen.


Hefes must be at least 50% wheat malt. My recipe had close to 60% wheat malt, with German pilsener malt and German CaraMunich I rounding out the grain bill. I used a little CaraMunich to darken the color and help with head retention. Wheat malt can sometimes cause a stuck mash because it gets very gummy, so I also added some rice hulls for bulk. The mash went well and my pre-boil gravity was very close to what I expected (1.040 vs. 1.041). I did a 75-minute boil and was able to cool the wort to 78 degrees in about 20 minutes afterward. My original gravity was 1.045, which was much lower than the expected 1.051. I am not sure why because the pre-boil gravity was so accurate. It might have just been a bad reading.


Jamil's podcast on hefes recommends fermenting at 62 degrees, which is much cooler than popular wisdom. To lower my temps, I placed the carboy in a water bath and added some freezer packs. By the next day, things looked good:

At this time the temps were in the high 60s but seemed to be coming down. I also thought that the fermentation had already peaked. 12 hours later I found a different story:

Hefe yeasts are notorious for causing blowoffs, so I should have seen this coming. The airlock didn't actually blow off, but it was completely clogged with residue and there was krausen running down the sides of the carboy. After I put the hose on the fermentation continued to be vigorous for another day before slowing down. I was also happy that the temp on the fermometer was between 62-64, so I think the water bath helped me reach the lower temps that I wanted. The beer is still in the fermenter. I'll probably transfer it to the keg this weekend, then try it in about a week. As I mentioned, these beers are best fresh, and I am really excited to see how it turns out.