Since I had quite an inventory of home brewed beer built up a break from brewing was in order, though I did not know that time off would turn into three months! So when I decided to start up again, I had to (in my mind) make up for lost time and brew frequently in the month of April. It also made for a good opportunity to try brewing a few styles that I have not attempted to tackle to this point. After (too) much thought, a Hefeweizen was first in line to go as a fairly simple recipe to ease back into things with.
This is the Hefeweizen that will be getting the infusion of POM that was provided to me free of charge via the generosity of Jeff Rushton. That process will happen as I rack the beer to secondary fermentation.
Now to get the first step out of the way, check out this short video of the set up before the start of brewing.
As always, I do my very best to ensure that everything used for my brewing has been sanitized to the best of my ability before getting started. With that, I again brought 2.5 gallons of water to about 160 degrees and put the following into the grain bag:
- 1.25 lb German Pilsner Malt
- 8 oz Cara Pils Malt
- 1.25 lb Red Wheat
Grains taking a bath
The grains were then soaked for 45 minutes while maintaining the temperature at about 155 degrees. The grain bag was then pulled out and I poured 2 quarts of 170 degree water over it to ensure all of the grainy goodness was not lost. I removed the pot from the heat and then added:
- 5 lb Wheat Extract
Once the malt extract was stirred in, the pot went back on the heat until there was a good rolling (controlled) boil. I set the timer for 60 minutes and then it was time for:
- Bittering hops – .75 oz Hallertau
- Flavoring hops – None this time
- Aroma hops – .25 oz Hallertau
Weighing out the hops
After the 60 minutes of boiling I was able to get everything pretty quickly down close to 80 degrees, though struggled with the last few degrees. Room temperature in my house this time of year hovers around 80 as the windows are open to the outdoor air quite a bit, so getting liquid cooled to below that is a bit of a struggle. I have continued to put off building a proper wort chiller, so I only have myself to blame until taking the time to do so. I have learned not to stress over those last few degrees though.
When the temperature was at roughly 84 degrees (with water added to about 5.25 gallons) I pitched in the bloomed Munich German Wheat dry yeast that I was using for the recipe. It was bloomed by adding the dry yeast to 1 cup of warm water and letting it sit for 15 minutes. I then boiled 1 tsp. in a small amount of water, cooled the mixture, added it to the yeast, and again covered it as I continued with the boiling step of brewing. All is well as fermentation was going strong by the time that I checked on it early the next morning and I expect a bit more of a banana profile resulting from the higher fermentation temperatures.
They are alive!
The original specific gravity came in at approximately 1.0461, which was a bit lower than expected (as usual for me). I will let it sit for a week or so before racking to secondary and adding the POM to the equation.
Stay tuned . . .
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