El Hefe Weizen from Gordon Strong. 1st timer

[Lion]

I am planning to make my 1st brew of this recipe http://wiki.homebrewersassociation.org/ElHefe but i have never done a batch larger than 1 gal and i pretty much know how much water add to mash, then to sparge and plan my boil accordingly. I reduced the amounts of grains and hops already just by doing math, now my issue is with the water per pound and the amount of yeast i should put in it. I have the wyeast 3068 slap package but according to instructions is for 5 gals.
my idea is to do 1.5 qts per pound of grain (5.450 lb of grain @ 1.5 qts= 8.175 qts of water?) how much water should i add to the mash and then to sparge to get my full boil wort?

any tips are really appreciate it.

thanks


Lion

[scotchpine]

Your ratio sounds good for the mash. Post mash out, I would think that if you are batch sparging, after you vorlauf and lauter to the boil kettle, just see how much you lack to reach your full volume. Then just add that much sparge water to your tun and then drain that to kettle. The grains have already reached their full absorption when the mash is over. Good luck

[Lion]

Thanks for your tips. I did it yesterday. Altought the recipe called for decoction mash. I did a step mash instead, dough in at 111• 15 min. Step to 131• 10 min. Step up to 145 for 40 min. Another step to 158• for 40 min and mash out at 170• for 15 min.

I got my gravity right on 1.050.

Pitched the whole wyeast pkg.
Is fermenting all right at 68-70• F


I am bottling and again I plan to increase the same priming methods I used for doing my 1gal batches.
For 1G is 3 tbsp of honey in a cup of water

So I'm thinking 9 tbsp in 3 cups??

I do not want this to overcarbonate.


Any ideas?

[thatguy314]

1 gallon? Do you get all your ingredients from the brooklyn brewshop?

Unless you want a honey flavor it's much easier to use corn sugar (or even table sugar)

Hefeweizens want to be very carbonated. I'd aim for about 2.75-3.5 volumes of CO2 (saisons and belgians are usually 3-3.5 volumes, with a range from 2.75-4.) By comparisons, you want to get american ales to about 2.25-2.5 volumes, and english ales from 1.5-2 volumes. Undercarbonation can make the beer seem too sweet, esp. for a beer that is that high residual sugar for a heffe, you probably want a little more carbonation. If you've ever had golden monkey by victory, they undercarbonate the bottles a bit, as regular 12oz bottles will burst with high carb if they get too hot, and it always tastes a bit flacid. It's fine by keg, where they carbonate it fully.

check out this website. it'll give you good advice for actual amounts. they have dextrose, sucrose, honey, and DME on there. http://www.brewheads.com/priming.php

[alan_marks]

1 gallon? Do you get all your ingredients from the brooklyn brewshop?

Unless you want a honey flavor it's much easier to use corn sugar (or even table sugar)

Hefeweizens want to be very carbonated. I'd aim for about 2.75-3.5 volumes of CO2 (saisons and belgians are usually 3-3.5 volumes, with a range from 2.75-4.) By comparisons, you want to get american ales to about 2.25-2.5 volumes, and english ales from 1.5-2 volumes. Undercarbonation can make the beer seem too sweet, esp. for a beer that is that high residual sugar for a heffe, you probably want a little more carbonation. If you've ever had golden monkey by victory, they undercarbonate the bottles a bit, as regular 12oz bottles will burst with high carb if they get too hot, and it always tastes a bit flacid. It's fine by keg, where they carbonate it fully.

check out this website. it'll give you good advice for actual amounts. they have dextrose, sucrose, honey, and DME on there. http://www.brewheads.com/priming.php

+1
Also, check out Jamil's pitching calculator at www.mrmalty.com to calculate the optimum pitching rate for your future brews. It just needs the yeast type, volume, starting gravity, and date the yeast was produced to let you know how much to active yeast to pitch.

[Lion]

1 gallon? Do you get all your ingredients from the brooklyn brewshop?

indeed I was. I gotta say they were good entry point tO brewing. I didn't know malt extracts until I was already into all grains with these kits.

I moved on now. Hence the 3 gallons batches from scratch.

I will go with corn sugar. And again I have never used it. I'll check the forums and the website to find more Info


Cheers!

[Lion]

+1
Also, check out Jamil's pitching calculator at http://www.mrmalty.com to calculate the optimum pitching rate for your future brews. It just needs the yeast type, volume, starting gravity, and date the yeast was produced to let you know how much to active yeast to pitch.

I did. I also asked my local shop and they said it wasn't going to be a lot of difference from 5 to 3 gal if I used the whole wyeast.




Thanks for the info.!

[gordonstrong]

Is fermenting all right at 68-70• F

It's kinda warm. I like to keep it below 65F. Preferably starting in the upper 50s and letting it rise to 62F or so.

We did a tasting of hefes at the NHC in San Diego that were fermented at different temperatures and mashed differently. The best flavor came from the one fermented cool (62F) and with a single decoction. Harold Gulbransen made them; he's also medaled in this category in the past. He knows what he's doing, especially in this style. So I'm convinced he made all test beers equally well.

I was on the tasting panel, and the difference was fairly clear. A warmer ferment gives a less clean flavor. It still tastes good, but it doesn't taste best. If you can't control your fermentation temps, try brewing it during a different part of the year when the ambient temperature is more suitable. The warmer one had more banana but it also had more of other flavors; the increased esters added an acidity, it seemed, including an apple-like flavor. Without running an analysis on the beer, it's hard to say what all was in there, but I just know what I tasted.

I'm convinced cooler fermentations produce cleaner tasting weizen beers. Don't misinterpret that statement. I can see some people saying, "but I don't want cleaner, I want banana and clove". Meant cleaner relative to that yeast. At cooler temps, you still get banana and clove. You just don't get other things. At higher temps, you do (or more appropriately, you increase the odds that you will).

That said, glad you made it and hope you like it. Warmer temps are not an automatic fail, but if you don't like some of the yeast flavors, I'd try it again with a different fermentation program and see how that works for you. That's been my experience and it seems backed up by others doing their own experiments.