One of my favorite beer styles, without a doubt, is weizen. The taste, aroma, and refreshment from a nice wheat beer is tough to beat, and that holds especially true for warm weather months. So with that in mind, I was ready to tackle my own version of a hefe based on a Mr Beer recipe just in time for spring.
Weizenguy - Brewed on 2/27/2010 - 1 can of MB Whispering Wheat Weizenbier - 1 lb of Golden Light DME- 1/3 oz. of Cascades - A half pack of Danstar Munich yeast **1st time using non-MB yeast!**
After reading (wayyyyyy too much) up on extract brewing techniques, I decided to boil ALL of the DME this time...just to kind of see how it worked out. So about 5 cups of water was used, and I mixed in the entire 1 lb. of the malt and let that situation boil for about 12 minutes, and then I commando added the Cascade hops for another 6 minutes. After flameout, mixed the can of WWW then chilled the wort to pitching temps. Meanwhile, I had to re-hydrate the Munich yeast per the instructions on the package. For the record, the half pack of Munich is a little more than twice the amount of yeast that MB provides in their packets, so there was not going to be an issue there.
Going along with its reputation, the Munich yeast cranked through a vigorous fermentation in less than one week, but I left the wort in the fermenter until 3/13/2010 then bottled The carbing went through 3/27/2010 Room temp condition through 4/10/2010 then chilled some out
1st tester bottle was 4/13/2010 (I couldn't wait!) test notes: nice hefe-esque aroma up front, but it is a little lighter in body and taste than a true German hefe. Not bad at all, but seems to be too hoppy on the nose and tongue (since when did I start talking like that?!?) ***June update: kind of tastes more like I unintentionally created an ale-wheat hybrid (I am thinking due to the hop addition). However, the Cascades are more in check and are quite pleasant. Since I had really wanted to make true weizen, I would not make this recipe for that purpose. But it was a good learning experience, and in the end the brew was tasty, so any complaints (to myself) are only minor.