Saturday 18 May 2013

Brew Day - Summer Lemon Hefeweizen

Trying a new arrangement in the
garage
Today I'm brewing a summer wheat. Hefeweizen aficionados will want to turn away now - I'm committing the unforgivable sin of brewing it with lemon (traditionally, hefeweizen is served without the lemon slice so often found in American wheats).

The beer itself is a mix of German and US style hefeweizen - a typical German grain/hop bill, with lots of pilsner malt and hallertauer hops, but fermented with a less estery US hefeweizen yeast. And yes, a lemon's worth of zest & juice goes into the batch.

Recipe & Brewday Below the Fold...

Summer Lemon Hefeweizen
Spice, Herb, or Vegetable Beer
Type: All Grain Date: 13-04-30
Batch Size (fermenter): 20.00 l Brewhouse Efficiency: 68.00 %
Boil Size: 25.49 l Est Mash Efficiency 71.4 %
Boil Time: 60 min End of Boil Volume 21.84 l

Ingredients:
Amt Name Type # %/IBU
0.23 kg Rice Hulls (0.0 SRM) Adjunct 1 4.6 %
2.50 kg Pilsner (2 Row) UK (1.0 SRM) Grain 2 50.2 %
2.00 kg Wheat Malt, Ger (2.0 SRM) Grain 3 40.2 %
0.25 kg Munich Malt (9.0 SRM) Grain 4 5.0 %
14.17 g Hallertauer [4.80 %] - Boil 60.0 min Hop 5 8.9 IBUs
14.17 g Hallertauer [4.80 %] - Boil 15.0 min Hop 6 4.4 IBUs
1.00 Items Lemon - Zest + Juice (Boil 0.0 mins) Flavor 7 -
From Bank American Hefeweizen Ale (WLP320) Yeast 8 -

Beer Profile:
Est Original Gravity: 1.050 SG Measured Original Gravity: 1.046 SG
Est Final Gravity: 1.012 SG Bitterness: 13.3 IBUs
Estimated Alcohol by Vol: 4.9 %Est Color: 3.5 SRM


Mash Profile:
Mash Name: Single Infusion, Light Body, No Mash Out Total Grain Weight: 4.98 kg
Sparge Water: 19.53 l Grain Temperature: 18 C
Sparge Temperature: 75.6 C Tun Temperature: 16 C
Adjust Temp for Equipment: TRUE Mash PH: 5.20

Name Description Step Temp Step Time
Mash In Add 11.20 l of water at 75.5 C 66.7 C 60 min

Sparge Step: Fly sparge with 19.53 l water at 75.6 C

Carbonation and Storage
Carbonation Type: Keg Volumes of CO2: 2.3
Pressure/Weight: 12 PSI Carbonation Used: Keg with 12.54 PSI
Keg/Bottling Temperature: 7.2 C Age for: 30.00 days
Fermentation: Ale, Single Stage Storage Temperature: 18.3 C

Brew Day:

Juice & Zest of 1 lemon
Brew day went as well as one could hope. Hit the mash temp dead-on, collected the right volume of sparge, gravity of the sparge was slightly higher than planned (1.043 instead of 1.041). Boil was uneventful, and I got some hop trellises built once the risk of boil-over had passed.

I carefully zested the lemon, to avoid putting an pith into the beer (pith - the white stuff under a lemon/citrus skin - is quite astringent). The juice + zest went in at the end of the boil, as to minimally drive off the lemon aroma.

Post-boil gravity was dead-on predicted - 1.050, with slightly more volume than I had originally anticipated. As you may imagine, I'm hardly saddened by more beer!

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