Brewing a Hefeweizen tomorrow. 10 gallons. Do I:
- Just pitch the two packs of WLP300, or
- Make a SNS starter tonight for each pack and pitch at high krausen
What’s the OG?
I make SNS for my 5 gallons out of 1 pack of WLP 300 and 1 litre of wort. OG of 1.050 and I have never had fermentation problems with it.
300 ferments like a mack truck!
The more relevant question is, how old are those packs? If really fresh, I would direct pitch. This a style that benefits from stressed yeast (within limits, of course).
Definitely this, I find with a very healthy pitch that I get zero esters which I personally prefer. But then ester production is a whole other rabbit hole to go down with this style with pitching rates and fermentation temp. Very interesting
I’ve had great luck with direct pitching hefeweizens when I am sure the yeast is fresh and healthy. If you aren’t sure, just make the starter.
Pragmatic
The OG is 1.050 and the two packs of WLP300 say best by 9/3/2021, which I assume it means it was packed on 3/2/2021 as I thought they used 6 months. Based on the earlier post, would you consider that really fresh? I’m still thinking of the SNS starter later tonight for a tomorrow after brew. Like someone else said, this is a style where you can endlessly play with the variables to see what it does to the finished beer.
Nearing two months old, you could probably go either way, but if it were me, I wouldn’t consider that fresh enough to direct pitch, and I’d make the starter. But then I wouldn’t actively aerate the hefeweizen wort, just to apply some stress on the yeast so as to bring out the banana ester. But of course this depends on how much you like that banana character (personally, I love it, so I make my hefs to really bring it out).
What’s your grain bill look like? Hefe is my favorite style to brew
50/50 Pils/Wheat
I’m trying red wheat in my next one see if there is a difference.
Anyone have exeperience doing a decotion with a german wheat?
I’ve done a decoction on 2 Hefeweizen batches. I have not had one batch with and one without to compare. If there is a difference, and I personally believe there is, it is minor. With no side-by-side comparison, there is a lot of room for bias in my observation.