Hi Rowan,
Way, way back (October 1997) I brewed one. I had a big assortment of small quantities of specialty grains left over and wanted to get rid of them. Because this beer was rather "big" it took a while for it to mellow. However, once it did, it was a dead ringer for Schneider Aventinus. Quite the feat, considering that I hadn't tasted Aventinus prior to brewing this. I actually had my first bottle about a month after I finished this keg. When I first tasted Aventinus, I couldn't believe how much it tasted like this batch, but I wasn't sure. I had my wife taste it and the first thing she said was "This tastes like the one you made." This was followed by me bouncing around the kitchen pumping my fist and yelling "YES! YES! YES! YES!" This is for a 5 gallon batch.
Grist:
3.15 kg wheat malt
2.40 kg 2-row pale malt
475 g roasted wheat (homemade: 230F 45 min, then 300F for 45 min)
475 g caramel wheat (homemade: I think I mashed it whole at about 150F then roasted it in the oven at something like 230F for 45 min)
400 g caravienne (20L)
325 g chocolate malt
163 g caramunich malt
A decoction mash was performed, and 3 ml of 21% phosphoric acid was added to the mash at the beginning.
Twenty-two (22) litres of tap water was added to the mash (some hot, some cold) to hit 98F for 20 minutes for an acid rest. 11 litres of the thickest part of the mash was pulled and separately heated to 158F. It was held at this temperature for 20 minutes, then boiled. It was allowed to boil for 10 minutes, then added back to the mash. The combination hit 145F, and I must not have been happy with this because according to my notes I immediately added another 2 litres of cold tap water. It then settled at 135F. I held this temperature for 20 minutes, then pulled another 12 litres of the thickest part of the mash and separately heated it to 158F, and held this temperature for 15 minutes, then boiled for 5 minutes. When it was added back the mash, the combination hit 154F, and I held this for 20 minutes. 6 litres of the thinnest part of the mash was then pulled, and I added 7 litres of tap water to this, then boiled it for 5 minutes. When it was added back to the mash, the temperature settled at 167F. This was a batch sparge (no extra water used for sparging - just drained whatever I could get out of the mash tun.) I collected 25 litres of wort in 50 minutes.
Boil: 90 minute duration. 1.5 oz Hallertauer Hersbrucker whole hops (3.2%) FWH (first wort hopped - basically added as soon as the runoff was started.) At the 75 minute point (15 minutes remaining in the boil), 1/4 tsp of Irish moss and 1 tsp of yeast nutrient were added.
The wort was chilled with an immersion chiller to 67F, and a starter of Wyeast 3068 Weihenstephan Wheat was pitched.
OG: 1.068
FG: 1.015
Primary fermentation at 62 - 68F for 14 days. Kegged and chilled to 40F, then force carbonated at 12 psi to hit 2.47 volumes of CO2.
Hope this helps.
-- Mark
