Rescue a failed hefe

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dufresne

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Well, brewed my 1st AG hefeweizen on 28/01.

Brew day went ok, but I had a couple of issues:

1) Whitelabs WLP300 - German hefeweizen. removed sachet from fridge 5 days before brewday as brewday had to be put off. So to counteract this, I made a starter.

2) Didn't get the efficiency I was hoping for.

3) Mashed too hot (again) but new thermometer is on it's way!

So, as expected with a hefe yeast, fermentation kicked off like an angry spouse. OG was 1.046 and now it's sitting about 1.010 (expected to finish 1.012) but there's (to my surprise) a lot of krausen that hasn't fallen yet and it's still kicking out bubbles.

Now I know it could develop over time, but normally my hefe's are ready to bottle or keg in about 7 days and when I pulled out some to test gravity tonight, it was quite thin, extremely pale and had none of the hefe yeasty character about it, a very clean yeast profile.

I like my hefe chewy, sweet and bananay.

I will leave this for another week, but just thinking of ways in which to rescue. It reminds me much more of an American wheat (I'll be sticking to wyeast 3068 from now on). I even fermented hot (22) to encourage the ester flavours, but maybe with the starter I over pitched and got none of those flavours?

I could dry hop it? I used herkules to bitter it, so still have loads left and I like the sound of the flavour profile...melon, black pepper.

I'm thinking it's worth a go, as it's just no right as it is.



Recipe:
3kg uk wheat
2kg German pilsner


Mashed at about 69/70C for 90min

8g herkules (17.0%AA) @60min

OG: 1.046 (expected 1.049)

Mashed at about 69/70C for 90min
 
So I ended up putting this one in for 12 days secondary fermentation and dry-hopped with 10g of herkules....which I'm not sure done much.
Bottled a week ago and first taste tonight....it's actually pretty banging!

Welcome to the world...Herkweizen!

DSC_0979.JPG
 

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