Mad Brewers Hoppy Hefe

[Rina]

First Choice Liquor Lutwyche.

Excellent beer, I really loved it. The Citra is there front and centre, with Motueka (which I'm now starting to think bears resemblance to a toned down Nelson Sauvin) supporting. Classy drop, not vanilla compared with some of the "special" beers the main stream crafties have produced.

But...........

It isn't a Hefeweizen.

According to German purity law - at least 50% of the grist must be wheat - whereas MB say only 45% is. So fail on the weizen.
It isn't a Hefe. It's just a non-brightened beer. Mit hefe indicates that there is the yeast suspended in the beer. It isn't. Therefore fail on Hefe.
It doesn't taste like a Hefe or Weissbier (Dunkel, Kristall or anything else). It tastes like an APA. Which means that their "pushing the style envelope" has produced an APA with a bit of wheat in it and 2 really good hop varieties added late in the kettle.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reinheitsgebot

 

[blakie21]

I notice it says on the side... to be shared..

Screw that! My mates wouldn't appreciate anything but the alcohol content! haha

 

[beers]

I grabbed a bottle of this on Tuesday & sampled last night. I struggle with the hefe, & wheat wine references.. but overall I find it to be a pretty damn solid effort at an American IPA. I've since purchased more :chug:

 

[tallie]

Finally tried it out of the bottle the other night - fantastic!

You were one day too early I saw them there yesterday.

They now have one less carton h34r:

There was a hold up due to having to re-package 8000 cartons caused by dodgy cardboard.

Yeah, the carton was a bit dodgy - looks like it might have gotten wet at some point (not really surprising given Brisbane's recent weather).

But...........

It isn't a Hefeweizen.

According to German purity law - at least 50% of the grist must be wheat - whereas MB say only 45% is. So fail on the weizen.
It isn't a Hefe. It's just a non-brightened beer. Mit hefe indicates that there is the yeast suspended in the beer. It isn't. Therefore fail on Hefe.
It doesn't taste like a Hefe or Weissbier (Dunkel, Kristall or anything else). It tastes like an APA. Which means that their "pushing the style envelope" has produced an APA with a bit of wheat in it and 2 really good hop varieties added late in the kettle.

Technicalities aside, I agree that it doesn't have the hefe wheat beer character you might expect. For me though, the mouthfeel, drinkability and hopping is sublime :icon_drool2: Looking forward to a few more over the weekend :beerbang:

Cheers,
tallie

 

[Rubix]

Picked up a bottle tonight from Woolworths in Cowes, Phillip Island. Nice drop and very easy drinking but even for an 'out there' hefeweizen it tastes just like a nice American IPA. Hops dominate most of the aroma or flavour from the yeast / wheat to the point where its almost lost. Still, very tidy drop and i'm sure that i'll pick up a few more while they last.

 

[Screwtop]

Tasted this on Mon, just a sip, but Wow!

Scotty from Thirsty Camel on River Rd Gympie (Bruce Hwy) sent a text Fri advising their delivery had arrived. Son and I downed quite a few Fri night.

The Citra is great but.....................don't ya love that Motueka Burp!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oh man. Tried this today.. spewing I only bought 1!

Heard this a number of times already regarding this beer. Well done to Maltshovels Mad Brewers!

Screwy

 

[bconnery]

It isn't a Hefeweizen.

According to German purity law - at least 50% of the grist must be wheat - whereas MB say only 45% is. So fail on the weizen.

Actually this is wrong. THe law does not dictate 50%, this is by tradition, the purity law does not dictate the % at all.

 

[Jazzafish]

How good is beer! Nothing better than a batch that shines above the rest, especially when it is an experimental batch.
Well done JS Mad Brewers! Takes stones to try something new on a commercial scale... wish it was done more often.

FYI, they (james squire) have a beer club and a newsletter. They offered pre orders for this batch to members... Why I didn't grab one is beyond me?

 

[Guysmiley54]

Had this on tap twice now and agree that the Citra/Motueka burst is great particularly considering that these guys don't seem to be using a heap of aroma hops of late.

Does anyone else find this beer far too sweet? I drank a schooner last night and found the last 3rd of the glass less enjoyable, so much that I didn't go back for seconds. It really is quite cloying to me. When I consider that they are billing it as a wheat beer, I don't mind that it's more an American style wheat beer but I still think it would have been a cracker if they used less crystal and got it to finish dry.

ymmv B)

 

[mikk]

Had this on tap twice now and agree that the Citra/Motueka burst is great particularly considering that these guys don't seem to be using a heap of aroma hops of late.

Does anyone else find this beer far too sweet? I drank a schooner last night and found the last 3rd of the glass less enjoyable, so much that I didn't go back for seconds. It really is quite cloying to me. When I consider that they are billing it as a wheat beer, I don't mind that it's more an American style wheat beer but I still think it would have been a cracker if they used less crystal and got it to finish dry.

ymmv B)

I agree- far too sweet for my liking, & very cloying. And it's not a hefe. We seem to be in the minority though, so i'm glad that other people seem to be loving it! I bought 3 bottles, but now only open them when i know i can give half away to someone else.

 

[Screwtop]

Had this on tap twice now and agree that the Citra/Motueka burst is great particularly considering that these guys don't seem to be using a heap of aroma hops of late.

Does anyone else find this beer far too sweet? I drank a schooner last night and found the last 3rd of the glass less enjoyable, so much that I didn't go back for seconds. It really is quite cloying to me. When I consider that they are billing it as a wheat beer, I don't mind that it's more an American style wheat beer but I still think it would have been a cracker if they used less crystal and got it to finish dry.

ymmv B)

I agree- far too sweet for my liking, & very cloying. And it's not a hefe. We seem to be in the minority though, so i'm glad that other people seem to be loving it! I bought 3 bottles, but now only open them when i know i can give half away to someone else.

Helps to be informed, have a read below, esp the underlined:

Our Hoppy Hefe however, is a cloudy wheat beer brewed with an outrageous late hop addition creating a strong fruity -citrus hop aroma. While also taking some inspiration for extremes from those “beardy-weirdy” American hop-head brewers, our team, as usual, were not content to follow the plan and stick to using only U.S. hops, nor to use traditional German wheat yeast.
So get ready for a beer with a difference.

The American take on this is the American Wheat Ale (can be filtered or unfiltered) and American Wheat Wine (can be up to 12%). These styles differ from their German heritage in that the yeast strains used are more typically ale-like and don’t impart the clove and banana characteristics; similarly hop flavour and bitterness may also be present (Americans being the hop-heads they are!) but generally only at low to moderate levels.

Our Mad Brewers’ take on these styles is the Hoppy Hefe. Hoppy in that we have really dialed up the hops - 2/3rds of which are added post fermentation (dry-hopped). While the beer is coarsely filtered (we had to… otherwise you would be ‘eating’ hops rather than drinking beer!) it still retains a haze from the presence of yeast left over from fermentation (Hefe).

Love it!!

Cheers,

Screwy

 

[mikk]

I prefer to be un-informed, as it makes my replies far easier to post!

Now that i have been informed, however, i would like to say that i still find this beer too sweet & cloying, hence my earlier post.

I'm glad that a lot of people like it, & i'm glad there's people like the Mad Brewers making stuff like this, even though i don't like this particular brew much.

I've been told that the draft version doesn't suffer as much from this though, so if anyone's tasted both maybe they can chime in?


Still, for the point of (friendly) argument, I think the confusion regarding the beer's style comes from using the word 'hefe'. If you call it 'hefe', & say it's a wheat beer, it would be fair to construe that it's a hefe-weizen. Obviously it's not, so using german words to describe an American style cloudy wheat beer is bound to cause some head-scratching.
Now, don't even get me started on Monteith's 'Doppelbock Winter Ale'!

 

[bconnery]

Tried this tonight. I definitely didn't find it too sweet or cloying. I loved the hoppy flavour.

Picked up a couple of extra bottles before I'd tried it and glad I did now...

I've found these Mad Brewers releases to be very hit and miss but from a personal point of view I'd class this firmly in the hit category...

 

[[email protected]]

I too enjoyed this release.

After reading the description the hefe association is pretty broad - simply a fact that hoppy hefe sounds more catchy than hoppy wheat beer!

Interesting how it has gone to a wider distribution beyond the specialty stores. BWS etc are stocking it which can only be a good thing for better beer.

 

[yum beer]

Got a nice shock this arvo after work, popped by local woolies and siting on pallet ready to go into fridge a carton of hoppy heffe, grabs a bottle lickety split, in the fridge till

next weekend.



Notice as I was walking out a couple of cartons of some American pale ales---never heard of them before, Wingwalker, going back tomorrow for a better investigation.

 

[ben_sa]

For anyone in Radelaide, Its on tap at the Lion in North Adelaide

 

[browndog]

Had this on tap twice now and agree that the Citra/Motueka burst is great particularly considering that these guys don't seem to be using a heap of aroma hops of late.

Does anyone else find this beer far too sweet? I drank a schooner last night and found the last 3rd of the glass less enjoyable, so much that I didn't go back for seconds. It really is quite cloying to me. When I consider that they are billing it as a wheat beer, I don't mind that it's more an American style wheat beer but I still think it would have been a cracker if they used less crystal and got it to finish dry.

ymmv B)

How much crystal did they use?

 

[petesbrew]

Had this the other night,
I gotta say on first sip I first thought "meh, the usual american hop flavour, nice but nothing exciting", but after a short while, wow, this was a delicious beer.
A dense but mellow hoppiness, and the mouthfeel was so damn smooth.
A great one to savour and appreciate.
Well done Mad Brewers!

 

[Lord Raja Goomba I]

The Reinheitsgebot basically doesn't exist in any meaningful forms, given European Law would basically override it.

Hence, adherence to it is basically either a selling point, or (as I've tried to intonate) forms the basis of a traditional style. And BJCP guidelines.

But...

Did no-one notice me say that it's a classy beer, and I love it. It's just that, given they are towing the whole "hefe" line, "hefe" meaning yeast, and the basis of the German wheat beer style (not the American one) - it failed at being what it says on the label.

However, it succeeded in being a fantastic beer. It singlehandedly reignited my desire to brew another APA - it was that good. I have some citra in the freezer, some centennial, chinook and the like. Whilst I won't be making this, a 6-7% big APA is on the cards, and that you Mad Brewers for making me want it so badly.

Excellent beer. Well constructed, near on perfect for an APA (but not a Weissbier).

Goomba

 

[mje1980]

Had a few on tap yesterday. Not really a fan. The upfront hopiness was nice, but the cloying finish put me off. I don't get the idea of a hoppy hefe.