Experimental Hefeweizen Three Way!

[Tahoose]

He's on a braumeister..

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

I gather you've got the gear to control your mash steps....if I was doing this on stovetop would attempting to do a rough steopped mash according to your process have a significant affect on the end product i.e. I turn the stove on ad off to boost temps as you have there.

The steps also do different things enzymatically. The lower ferulic acid rest gives us the precursors for those clove flavours, for instance. So yes it would have a significant effect. Can you do it on stovetop? I'm not sure. I reckon a decoction (take some off, bring it to the boil, and use that to raise the mash temp as it is returned to the main batch) approach would be a better option in your case, but I haven't tried it myself.

 

[madpierre06]

The steps also do different things enzymatically. The lower ferulic acid rest gives us the precursors for those clove flavours, for instance. So yes it would have a significant effect. Can you do it on stovetop? I'm not sure. I reckon a decoction (take some off, bring it to the boil, and use that to raise the mash temp as it is returned to the main batch) approach would be a better option in your case, but I haven't tried it myself.

Thanks for that info mate, much good food for thought. I'll give it a go I think, there's little harm as I see it and much to be gained.

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

I kegged and bottled the hefeweizens today.

All three finished at 1.011/1.012 and were pretty visually similar.



I won't give away too much of my first impressions from the hydro samples here as I am hoping to get about 15 blind tests from folks who may read here, but some general interesting things:

• WLP300 had the largest krausen by at least a factor of 2. The Danstar Munich had a very small krausen.
• Danstar was the only one that had anything resembling a solid cake. I was bottling in warm weather and the WB06 and WLP300 cakes were very loose in the remaining wort post kegging.
• WB-06 frothed like a rabid bear during bottling. For some reason I decided to bottle these guys warm. I think I've done this with my Hefs once or twice before, but not in summer. I get why there was frothing, and all three batches did abit, but the WB-06 was about 1/3 froth when it hit the rim. I can't think why that one was different.

One thing that occurred to me in tasting these samples is that a lot of people ferment their Hefs at a single temp in the low 20s. Given my beer never hits that, I'd be really interested if another brewer did this experiment with a straight 20/22 degree ferment. What we may see is that it's not just down to one yeast being better than another, but that they have their own ideal spots? I'd hate to indict the dry yeasts off one experiments if that's what happens here (as many have assumed it will)

I hope to post back in about 2-3 weeks with a writeup of all the blind tastings.

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

The results are in. I've wrangled the last of the stragglers to provide their feedback. I engaged around 20 people to contribute. Most were Canberra Brewers and members of my BJCP 'study group'. There are a few BJCP trained folk, a few guys who I know have judged Hefe's at nats or ACTAABC before, a Plonk employee, an ex Wig and Pen assistant brewer, and few complete novices and non beer nerds. A pretty good mix.

TL;DR version, the liquid yeast was the winner for almost everyone, with 3 out of 15 people deviating and rating it worst.

Beer 1 - Danstar Munich average score: 33.5
Beer 2 - WLP300 average score: 38.5
Beer 3 - WB-06 average score: 34.5

I wasn't surprised to see some deviation, but I was shocked to see three people give the liquid yeast high 20s when everyone else gave it high 30s/low 40s. My gut feeling is that it's down to a a bottling issue or a bottling mixup. I don't think it's down to opinion differences because two of the three 'low raters' have previously sent a very similar WLP300 beer to the nats.

If I were to chalk it down to a mixup, an adjusted average would be the same split, but a bit wider:

Beer 1 - Danstar Munich adjusted average score: 33
Beer 2 - WLP300 adjusted average score: 41
Beer 3 - WB-06 adjusted average score: 35


Everyone's judging results are up here: View attachment Results.htm

My general observations on this experiment:

• WLP300 or equivalent liquid yeasts seem to be necessary, or at least very helpful in creating a great hefeweizen.
• WB-06 does a pretty bang up job for a dry yeast.
• Danstar Munich was the least 'heffy' for most people. My takeaway from this is that the Danstar is not appropriate for Hefewiezens. That said, I do use a pretty niche fermentation schedule and don't even hit 20 degrees, where most people feel that hef character arrives best. I wonder if anyone else wants to try a similar expression in a low 20s ferment and see if the results differ?
• Danstar Munich was the least varacious at most flocculant as well. It clumped and dropped first and took the longest to carbonate.
• People's perception of flavours like 'banana' and 'clove' vary quite a bit...

...and that brings me to my last thought...This experiment has really changed my thoughts on judging.

We always talk about thresholds for bad flavours - "I am sensitive to acetaldehyde" - "I can't pick diacetyl" etc, but it seems to me most people don't think of thresholds on positive flavours. I've never heard someone say "I struggle to pick a hefe banana character as much as others, so I must adjust my criticism/praise". I've certainly seen judges back down when the other two at the table get a nose full of butterscotch and they acknowledge they don't normally get it.

For Hefs, I have been with judges who struggle to find the clove, but I don't know if that translated to judging with them acknowledging a weakness to the aroma - they just said they couldn't get much clove and seemingly pinged the beer for it. Personally, I found zero hef character in the danstar beer and thought it closer to an American Wheat. The WLP300 beer seemed to have a subdued, but balanced character to me. Others found it full of banana. I'll definitely keep this in mind for my future judging.

I think I might continue to do experiments like this from time to time. I am doing a Belgian Golden Strong in March. I might try to do a semi-controlled look at the effect of adding simple sugar additions at the start vs during fermentation. Stay tuned.

 

[BroMozzie]

Did you say which bottle (1,2,3) corresponded to which yeast?

I am 99.5% sure that my "bottle #1" was WLP-300 - I've done this experiment myself in the past and I know WLP-300 as well as I know any yeast strain. (I got a 3rd place Nats medal for my hefe a few years back and I believe you use my recipe, Kev ) I wouldn't rule out muddling the bottles my end at tasting time (I was in a bit of hurry).

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

I've just re-edited the post. You either got a mixed up batch or mad bad palate

 

[BroMozzie]

My wife (who knows her wheat beers if not much else) and my daughter (who has a scary good palate for a 12 year old) agreed with me, so one of us must have mixed up the numbers. :blink:

 

[Mr. No-Tip]

and I believe you use my recipe, Kev )

Almost. No late hops in mine, a bit more munich, to IIRC. Slightly different ramp temps, but I def credit you for the baseline