Banana and Clove. Best yeast to bring out those flavors

[tomsawyer]

I had some sulfur at 62F (with wlp380) but I don’t always remember the nutrient.

[thirsty_monk]

@majorvices

I sure wish I had an answer to this weird problem because I like using WY (a professional pitch is a good deal cheaper from WY as opposed to WL) but I’ll probably stay away from that strain from now on.

Did you try BSI out of CO?
They have a lot of strains. (for commercial brewers only).

[jmcamerlengo]

@majorvices

@liquidbrewing

Enhancing clove and banana character???  Why on earth would you want to do that?  I can’t stand cloves in a beer, roasted pork shoulder, yes, beer no.

well, I completely disagree. Clove phenols in a hefeweizen is imperative IMO.

The ferulic acid rest is a good suggestion. I heard someone mention recently using a vial of WLP300 blended with a vial of wlp380. I am planning on trying that when I brew my dunkleweizen soon. You get nice clove character from the 380 and cleaner banana from the 300 hundred. One tip: ferment fairly cool. I pitch mine at 56-58 and keep the fermentation very low through the first third. This seems to enhance the clove character, otherwise the banana tends to become predominant. You may need to experiment with temps to strike the balance you prefer.

Yes!! Ferulic acid rest + blend of WLP380 and WLP300 + pitch at 56-58 and ramp to 62 over the the first day of fermentation makes a pretty awesome Hefe.

[konrow (Malticulous)]

I have not been able to see a correlation between using the acid rest and not using one. Kai did do one experiment.
http://braukaiser.com/lifetype2/index.php?op=ViewArticle&articleId=130&blogId=1

I’ve never used yeast nutrients and I never had sulfur problems.

[majorvices]

I have not been able to see a correlation between using the acid rest and not using one. Kai did do one experiment.
http://braukaiser.com/lifetype2/index.php?op=ViewArticle&articleId=130&blogId=1

I’ve never used yeast nutrients and I never had sulfur problems.

I remember when Kia posted his info. I’ll admit I haven’t done an acid rest since I have gone commercial and I seem to get plenty of clove phenols. But I do believe that an acid rest can help, otherwise I find it hard to believe that any brewery would waste the time performing one. But I don’t think it is essential.

[drmario47]

Thanks again guys. Im gunna try it again today to see if the flavor improved.
Cheers

[konrow (Malticulous)]

Thursday I brewed a hefeweizen. I did 113F for 10 minutes, 122 for 10 minutes, 145 for 30 pulling the the thick mash about 10 in. It boiled for about 10 minutes to bring the mash to 158. 20 minutes later I pulled thin mash, boiled it 10 minutes and used it for a mash out. I pitched a 6 hour old simple 1L Wy3068 starter into the air saturated 20L of wort, stirred it in well and took back 1L for another starter.

Yesterday I made a dunkelweizen with nearly the same mash schedule except it rested at 113 for 20 minutes. I used the 1L I stole from the hefeweizen for the starter.

I hope to get good banana and some clove, but I think 1L may make for too high of pitch rate. The hefeweizen seems to have stopped fermenting today. It blow off a little yesterday.

[oly]

Thursday I brewed a hefeweizen. I did 113F for 10 minutes, 122 for 10 minutes, 145 for 30 pulling the the thick mash about 10 in. It boiled for about 10 minutes to bring the mash to 158. 20 minutes later I pulled thin mash, boiled it 10 minutes and used it for a mash out. I pitched a 6 hour old simple 1L Wy3068 starter into the air saturated 20L of wort, stirred it in well and took back 1L for another starter.

Yesterday I made a dunkelweizen with nearly the same mash schedule except it rested at 113 for 20 minutes. I used the 1L I stole from the hefeweizen for the starter.

I hope to get good banana and some clove, but I think 1L may make for too high of pitch rate. The hefeweizen seems to have stopped fermenting today. It blow off a little yesterday.

A bit of thread drift…but do you mind posting your dunkelweizen recipe? I have one scheduled for next week with 3068. Planning 60% wheat, 40% munich  but a bit clueless what to add to darken; considering to add one of either chocolate, chocolate wheat, or midnight wheat to give it some color. Any recommendations?

[hokerer]

@oly

A bit of thread drift…but do you mind posting your dunkelweizen recipe?

Not his particular recipe, but here’s one from a ways back that managed to take a gold…

http://www.homebrewersassociation.org/forum/index.php?topic=4001.msg46108#msg46108

[konrow (Malticulous)]

This is the one fermenting now. I never brew one the same twice.

Homebrew Beer Recipes (Brew Any Style!) All-Grain & Extract

[oly]

Thanks for the recipe help, just what I needed. 
I’ll probably do a single infusion, not up to the step/decoctions yet.

[konrow (Malticulous)]

I finally got around to packaging my weiss biers today. There is not much banana in the Hefeweizen but the dunkel is loaded with banana. The grain bills are quite a bit different but I know it’s all form the pitch rates. The mash schedule and fermenting temperature were the same.

Playing with Wyeast’s calculator it seems I pitched the hefe at 9 million cells per milliliter and the dunkel at only 3 million. I believe that just one pack of yeast (or a very small starter just to prove the yeast) is the best way to get banana. Chris white said in his new book that 5 million per milliliter is best for hefes and some British ales.

I didn’t notice any clove phenols. Maybe it will come out when it’s conditioned.

[thcipriani]

@majorvices

I use the White Labs nutrient for all my batches. Good thought though. Also, the first batch I brewed I fermented around 64. The second I did at 58. The 58 degree one actually had less of the sulphur character. I am totally stumped what the problem was. Definitely open to any suggestions.

What was your pitching rate and O2 rate? I recently pitched a hefe with 3068 at 12E6/mL, O2 to 13 mg/L – really sulfury.

I recently read an abstract on the MBAA site about how beers with pitching rates of 3, 6, 9 and 12E6/mL finished with an even cell count. Higher pitching rates lead to older cell populations. My theory is that a low vitality (resulting from an older cell population) yeast is either more likely to produce sulfur OR is less able to clean sulfur out after creating it.

Tried to brew the same hefe recently with identical process, but pitched at 6E9/mL (and 8.5mg/L O2) and it tastes great.

Grasping at straws, more data points would be helpful.