Screwy's Recipe 62 - Screwy's Noble Wheat

This 5 gallon recipe is designed using the Weizen/Wiessbier wheat beer style guidelines for gravity, bitterness and color. It includes Muntons Wheat Dry Malt Extract as the backbone of the recipe with some steeped Crystal 10L for improved head retention and body. I'm targeting the Paulaner Hefe Weizen wheat beer style I and some friends have been drinking lately.

I included two pounds of Pure Clover Honey to boost the alcohol content and enhance the aroma of cloves imparted by the Safbrew WB-06 wheat beer yeast strain. I would like to have used German Hallertauer hop additions for bitterness, flavor and aroma but I had to substitute Crystal hops instead because the German Hallertauer hops weren't available.

Honey, Wheat DME, Crystal Hops, WB-06 And Crystal 10L (Not Shown)

This recipe is geared toward a 5 gallon batch but and I've also included the recipe in qBrew download format so it won't be hard for others to tailor it to different size batches if needed. It's an extract with steeping grains recipe so it doesn't require more than 4-5 hours to brew depending on your brewing pace. I like the wheat beers because they're ready to drink in about 3-4 weeks and they taste great.

Screwy's Noble Wheat SRM 7

I loaded qBrew with my Recipe #58 and made a few slight changes to my previous wheat beer recipe substituting Crystal 10L for the CaraPils I used the last time. I also had to use Crystal hops in this recipe since my favorite Halleteur hops were not available on brewday. The Crystal pellet hops I used had a lower percentage of alpha acid so I had to adjust the boil times in order to get the correct IBU range, something that qBrew does very easily. Once the new recipe was tweaked I saved it as Recipe 62 - Noble Wheat.qbrew and emailed the list to Princeton Homebrew for pickup later that day.

Estimated IBU=9, SRM=7, OG=1.062, FG=1.016, ABV=6.0%

 Click to download Screwy's latest qBrew database   

Recipe:

Click to download this recipe file for qBrew
Recipe: Size 5.00 gallons: Estimated IBU=9, SRU=7, OG=1.062, FG=1.016, ABV=6.0%
2 pounds honey

1 pound Crystal 10L

5 pounds Muntons Wheat DME - 55% Wheat/45% Barley

1/2 ounce Crystal pellet hops boiled for 60 minutes

2 pounds of Honey for 30 minutes

1/2 ounce Crystal pellet hops boiled for 20 minutes

1 ounce Crystal pellet hops boiled for 7 minutes

11.5 gram Safbrew WB-06 dry yeast

Pitched at 70F and fermented at 70F until final gravity is steady for 2 days

Directions:
** Steep grains in 3 gallons of 153F filtered water for 30 minutes **

Remove grain bag from 20 quart boil pot

Stir in DME top off with filtered water and bring to a hard boil

Add hops at 60 minutes

Stir in clover honey and boil for 35 minutes

Add hops and boil for 20 minutes

Add Whirlfloc and boil for 9 minutes

Add hops and boil for 7 minutes

Place in ice bath, or use wort chiller until wort temperature cools to 70F

Aerate and pitch yeast at 65-70F
Ferment at 68F temperature until final gravity is steady for 2 days
Add 1/2 ounce Cascade hops for finishing and let soak for 5 days

The Grains Steeped For 30 Minutes Before Adding DME

I filled up a 20 quart boil pot with about three gallons of filtered water and set it on the burner, this would be my steeping pot. When the water hit about 160F I put the steeping grains in and checked the temperature to make sure it stayed at 153F-155F for the entire 30 minutes of the steep. During this time I rounded up all the bowls, spoons and thermometers I'd need for rehydrating the Safbrew wb-06 dry yeast.

Boiled Filtered Water Cooled To 95F And Dry Yeast

Of course I kept the bowls covered the entire time, except when stirring the yeast slurry, so that no bugs or other things like mold spores and wild yeast can get in. The bowls were soaked in One-Step for 10-15 minutes and I boiled filtered water for 15 minutes and then cooled it down to 95F before sprinkling in the dry yeast. I also soak the yeast packets and scissors in One-Step for at least 10 minutes before cutting open the packets.

Safbrew wb-06 Rehydrated In 95F Water Before Pitching

 Since reading Chris White and Jamil Zainasheff's newest book 'Yeast: The Practical Guide to Beer Fermentation' I've learned a new respect for the yeast I use in my homebrewing. On page 124 of the book they wrote how important it is to rehydrate dry yeast before pitching it into wort, in fact they included the following line 'Failure to rehydrate dry yeast properly will result in the death of approximately half the cells'. It's so easy to do and such a standard part of my brewing process now I always rehydrate any dry yeast before pitching it.

Adding 5 Pounds Of Dry Wheat/Barley Extract Mix

Once the steeping was done I added the 5 pounds of wheat DME to the boil pot and stirred it in really good before the wort began to boil. I found that doing it this way reduced the chances of having a hotbreak boil over while making the DME clumps easier to dissolve into the wort.

20 Quart Pot With Wort, DME, WhirlFloc And Hop Additions

As the wort boiled for 60 minutes I added in my hop additions. During this time I also rehydrated the dry yeast and sanitized the LBKs and cooling coils. I also kept another 16 quart pot of filtered water boiling on a back burner. As the water level dropped in my main boil pot I would use the extra boiling water to replace the water that had evaporated from the wort.

Cooling Wort Down To Pitching Temperature

My hotside brewing had gone as planned so it was time to start cooling down the wort and getting it ready for pitching the rehydrated yeast. I had topped off the boilpot with boiling water about 10 minutes before flameout to make sure I had enough wort in the boilpot before cooling it down. My racking cane, tubing, LBKs, spoon and yeast were all ready, waiting for the wort temperature to get down low enough to begin racking to the fermentors.

Transferring The Cooled Wort To The 2 Mr. Beer Fermentors

 I also put a couple of frozen water bottles into my fermentation chamber to cool it off before putting the filled LBKs inside it. Right after pitching the yeast I move the LBKs into the fermentation chamber to help prevent the temperature inside the fermentors from getting too high. I found that doing this, in combination with rehydrating the dry yeast and providing plenty of aeration reduces the lag time and gets the primary fermentation off to a vigorous start.

Original Gravity Came Out 1.054

The interesting thing about the OG of this batch is that it came out 8 points lower than qBrew had calculated. I'm thinking that possibly the 1.045 rating on the wheat DME and the 1.035 rating for the honey may have been too high. Even with the lower gravity reading this beer should still develop alcohol levels in the 5% range which is pretty respectable for a nice wheat beer.

According to the experts yeast do best when the oxygen levels in the wort are between 8-10 parts per million. In reality most homebrewers introduce between 4-6 parts per million of dissolved oxygen into their wort by either shaking or whisking the fermentor and wort causing it to foam up. With a lot of effort the dissolved oxygen levels can get as high as 6-8 parts per million or when using an aquarium pump and air stone.To hit levels of 10 parts per million you really need to have a bottle of oxygen handy.

Plenty Of Aeration To Assure A Vigorous Fermentation

I peeked in on the LBKs after 12 hours of fermentation and was happy to see that both fermentors had taken off as expected. The combination of the right amount of fresh yeast, proper rehydration and a well aerated 70F wort had all worked together nicely to keep the yeast healthy and the fermentation strong.

Short Lag Time And A Strong Primary Fermentation In 12 Hours

For the next few days I'll keep an eye on the temperature inside the fermentors. I now that during peak primary fermentation the yeast can cause the temperature of inside the LBKs to go up and the increased heat if left unchecked will mean higher levels of esters which in turn will introduce stronger banana flavors in this wheat beer. This is like the fifth or sixth time I've brewed this beer so I pretty much know already how it will taste once it's ready to drink. I figure at 70F the fermentation should be done in about 8-10 days and adding in another 2-3 days for the yeast to do their cleanup and another 10-14 days to naturally carbonate the beer to 3.5 volumes of Co2. By next month I'll be drinking a really nice wheat beer just as the fall weather takes hold here in the northeast.

Final Gravity Held At 1.014 For 3 Days

The final gravity reading came out about 2 points lower than qBrew had estimated finishing at 1.014 instead of 1.016. To me this beer finishing off at 5.3% ABV is just about perfect because I usually like to drink a couple of them at a time without worrying about getting too hammered.

Transferring The Beer To The Bottling Bucket

I cooled down the boiling water and sugar solution to 70F and and then racked the wheat beer on top of it, I also sanitized my Teflon spoon and gently swirled the beer and sugar solution together to mix them up really good. From there I used the bottling bucket and bottling want to fill the 12 ounce bottles. I rinsed the bottles out with hot water and then gave them 3 quick squirts of StarSan before placing them on the bottle tree to drain until filling.

Bottles Sanitized With StarSan

I filled the corny keg directly from the fermentor adding a priming solution of 9 tablespoons of pure cane sugar boiled in a half cup of water to the keg first. The bottling solution was at 70F when I added it to the keg and the beer from the fermentor mixed in with it as the keg filled. Once the keg was filled I hit it with 20 psi of Co2 to set the seal and then vented it a couple of times to purge out any oxygen.

9 Tablespoons Of Pure Cane Sugar For 2.5 Gallons

Screwy's Recipe 58 - Screwy's Noble Wheat

This 5 gallon recipe is designed using the Weizen/Wiessbier wheat beer style guidelines for gravity, bitterness and color. It includes Muntons Wheat Dry Malt Extract as the backbone of the recipe with some steeped CaraPils for improved head retention and body. Taste wise it is remarkable similar to the Paulaner Hefe Weizen wheat beers I had during lunch with some friends.

I also added a bit of Pure Clover Honey to boost the alcohol content and enhance the aroma of cloves imparted by the Safbrew WB-06 wheat beer yeast strain. There are 3 German Hallertauer hop additions for bitterness, flavor and aroma to lend just the right finish.

Hallertau, Honey, Wheat DME, CarPils Malt And Safbrew WB-06

 I was able to brew this recipe in just under 4 hours from start to the end of cleanup and even had time to clean out some bottles and a corny keg in the process. It's pretty much the same exact recipe I brewed back in May 2011 but this time I based the recipe on a 5 gallon batch size. I also used CaraPils for the steeping grains to enhance the body and head retention and because of it's light color.

Screwy's Noble Wheat SRM 4

As always I begin my recipe design by opening qBrew and loading in the most recent version of the recipe and begin my research. The last batch produced some very drinkable beer in about 3-4 weeks. The bottle carbonation levels and mouthfeel were perfect and the finish had soft notes of nutmeg and clover. Although the addition of Carahell steeping grains produced a slightly darker SRM 8 beer that was still within range of the Weizen style.

Estimated IBU=13, SRU=4, OG=1.053, FG=1.013, ABV=5.2%

 Click to download Screwy's latest qBrew database   

Recipe:

Click to download this recipe file for qBrew
Recipe: Size 5.00 gallons: Estimated IBU=13, SRU=4, OG=1.053, FG=1.013, ABV=5.2%

2 pounds honey

1 pound CaraPils

4 pounds Muntons Wheat DME - 60% Wheat/40% Barley

1/2 ounce Halleteur pellet hops boiled for 30 minutes

  2 pounds of Pure Clover Honey for 25 minutes

1/2 ounce Halleteur pellet hops boiled for 17 minutes

  1 ounce Halleteur pellet hops boiled for 7 minutes

11.5 gram Safbrew WB-06 dry yeast

Pitched at 65F and fermented at 65F until final gravity is steady for 2 days

Directions:
** Steep grains at 153F for 30 minutes **

Remove grain bag, stir and pour into 12 quart boil pot

Top pot off with filtered water and bring to a boil

Add hops at 30 minutes

Stir in clover honey and boil for 25 minutes

Add hops and boil for 17 minutes

Stir in DME and boil for 10 minutes

Add Whirlfloc and boil for 9 minutes

Add hops and boil for 7 minutes

Place in ice bath, or use wort chiller until wort temperature cools to 70F

Aerate and pitch yeast at 65-70F
Ferment at 65F temperature until final gravity is steady for 2 days

I filled up a 12 quart boil pot 1 gallon of filtered water and set it on the burner, this would be my steeping pot. When the water hit about 160F I put the steeping grains in and checked the temperature to make sure it stayed at 153F for the entire 30 minutes of the steep. While this was heating up I filled my 20 quart boil pot with filtered water and set it on a burner, this would later be my make up water volume for both 12 quart boil pots.

Steep 1 Pound Of CaraPils @ 153F For 30 Minutes

After 30 minutes of steeping I could see the color of the wort was much lighter than my previous batch, the substitution of CaraPils in place of Carahell malt for the steep will definitely make my beer lighter in color. I removed the grain bag and began moving half of the steeped wort into another 12 quart pot for the side by side boils.

Two 12 Quart Pots With Steeped Wort

With the steeped wort evenly distributed between both pots, I topped them off with the heated water from the 20 quart pot to get both up to their full wort volumes. As I re-brew my house recipes and locking down their ingredients and brewing processes I try to save time by planning long running tasks ahead of time and to run in parallel wherever possible. Heating 20 quarts of water on my stovetop takes at least 30 minutes and by heating it the same time I do the two 12 quart pots it's pretty close to boiling by time the steeping is done.

12 Quarts Pots With Steeped Wort And Full Boil Volume

At this point both pots were heating up to boiling so I started getting my yeast ready. I filled 2 White Labs yeast tubes with filtered water, poured them into a small pot and added some extra water to compensate for losses due to boil off. I then soaked a small bowl, fork and the 2 yeast tubes in One-Step for 10 minutes to get them ready for use.

11 Gram Package Of Safbrew WB-06 Split In Two

I boiled the measured water for 10 minutes, let it cool down to 90F and then filled the 2 yeast tubes with it. Next I emptied the yeast tubes into the small sanitized bowl, sprinkled in the dry yeast and soaked the tubes and caps in One-Step again. After 20 minutes I stirred the yeast into a cream using a sanitized plastic fork, filled both tubes, capped them tightly and placed them caps down in a small bowl of the sanitizing solution.

1 Pound Of Pure Clover Honey Per Pot

Since I've read so many different takes on how brewers are using honey in their recipes and brewing process I finally decided to boil the honey for 25 minutes. I'm convinced that this length of time in the boil will kill off any wild yeast or bacteria that could cause problems later on. At 30 minutes my first hop addition went in followed 5 minutes later by the honey addition. The flavor hop additions went in 8 minutes later followed by the addition of the wheat DME 7 minutes after that.

Wheat DME Gets 10 Minute Boil With Hops And Honey

The WhirlFloc and last aroma hop addition went in and when the boil was done I used the wort cooler to get the wort down to the 70-75F pitching temperature. It's important to cool your wort as quickly as possible to prevent wild yeast and bacteria from contaminating it causing off flavors or making it undrinkable. I place my boil pot in the sink, fit my wort cooler inside it and turn on the water flow.

Wort Cooler Gets The Temperature Down Quickly

Using an auto siphon makes moving your beer out of the boil pot almost fun and leaves most of the debris behind in the process. I can't even imagine how I did without one for so long, all the spills have been eliminated and my primary fermenters contain so much less trub than when I used to simply pour the wort into the fermenter.

The Auto Siphon Is A Huge Time Saver

With the temperature near 70F and the wort transferred to the fermenter I aerated and pitched my yeast. I poured the rehydrated dry yeast from one of the two tubes I had prepared earlier directly into the fermenter and aerated it again before screwing on the lid.

Half A Rehydrated Package Of Safbrew WB-06 Wheat Yeast

I rinsed off the outside of the fermenter and then wiped it dry using a clean towel and put it inside my fermentation chamber to ferment. I placed a few frozen water bottles in there  to drop the initial fermentation temperature down to the 65-70F range.

Original Gravity 1.054

The original graviy reading showed 1.054 which was only a point off of the qBrew recipe calculation. The color of the wort was also lighter in color then my initial recipe making the cosmetic appearance of this beer closer to the lower end of the BJCP style guideline.

12 Hours Later Both Fermenters Showed A Lot Of Activity

The next morning I checked in on the fermentation progress and found both fermenters had a healthy initial fermentation going. I will be fermenting this batch in the mid sixties until they both reach their estimated final gravity of 1.013. At the 65F temperature I can see them both going about 10 days before I take my first readings.

Bottling Day: (09-Jul-2011)

Noble Wheat Day 11 - FG Was 1.010 At 70F

 Today I had my second consecutive hydrometer reading of 1.010 at 70F so it was time to bottle it. My Bottle Priming Calculator, for a German Weissbier style beer, called for 3.6 to 4.48 volumes of Co2 as the correct carbonation range. This quickly translated to 8 tablespoons of pure cane sugar for a 2.25 gallon batch to get 4 volumes which was right in the middle of that range.

Cooling Priming Sugar Solution To 70F In Ice Pan

 I dissolved 8 tablespoons of pure cane sugar into about a cup of filtered water and boiled it in a small pot while stirring for 10 minutes. After the boil was complete I filled a pan with cold water and placed the pot in it then added a bunch of ice cubes to cool the solution down faster.

Adding Priming Solution First Before Transferring The Beer

 Once the priming solution reached 70F I poured it into a sanitized Mr. Beer keg that I used for my bottling bucket. I transferred the 70F beer from the fermenter to the bottling bucket using a small length of vinyl tubing that reached to the bottom of the bottling bucket. After all the beer was transferred I used a sanitized long handle plastic spoon to gently swirl the beer around a few times to make sure it was mixed thoroughly.

Transferring Fermented Beer To Bottling Bucket

 I like using a bottling bucket for 2 very important reasons. It leaves nearly all of the dead yeast and trub behind in the primary fermenter and out of your bottled beer. It also mixes the beer completely with the priming sugar solution to give you more uniform carbonation between bottles from the same batch.

Sanitized Bottle Tree With 48 Long Necks

With the beer and priming solution mixed and ready to go I began filling the 12 ounce bottles that I had sanitized earlier and allowed to drain for about 30 minutes. The sprayer at the top of the bottle tree really makes the sanitizing go by quickly, just 2 or 3 pumps and the bottles done and ready to drain.

I dip the bottle necks into the sanitizing solution before using the pump to spray their inside and I soak the bottle caps in the sanitizer. This is just to make sure that the entire surface of the bottle that comes in contact with the bottle cap is free of contamination before capping them.

46 Long Neck Bottles Of Noble Wheat

My long handled bench capper makes short work of capping the bottles. I can cap a case of long necks in only a couple of minutes. I fill the bottle with beer, place a cap on top to prevent anything from getting inside and when I have them all done I quickly press the caps on. A quick wipe with a wet washcloth gets any spilled beer off the bottles before I put them in a plastic container to carbonate.

Screwy's Noble Wheat Poured From Bottle

 After initially thinking I had some issues with bottling I found out I was mistaken when I poured a my first glass from a bottle that had been cold conditioned in the refrigerator for 2 weeks. The color came out perfectly according to the calculations I had gotten from qBrew and the taste was absolutely amazing and spot on. This is an easy to brew recipe that produces a really easy to drink wheat beer with plenty of flavor. The combination of the Halleteur hops, Safbrew WB-06, Clover Honey and Pilsner steeping grains combine to make this a very rewarding beer to add to my pipeline.