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Simple Hefeweizen Recipe

Summer is on the way and its time to start thinking about your favorite thirst quencher.
In the summer, wheat beers are probably one of the most popular brews to start with. Some other summer brews include Cream Ale, Lawnmower Beer, and Summer Ale.

This recipe is about as easy as it gets. The beauty of doing a good wheat is that quality results lie in your process, not so much in your recipe.

All the experts agree that fermenting your Weizen at 62F to 65F degrees gives you the best ratio of banana to clove and keeps a lot of the harsher phenols and alcohols under control. Be sure to pitch a large enough and healthy starter with this one. Don’t skimp on the aeration or oxygenation as well.

Here is my basic wheat to get you started:

EASY SUMMER WHEAT
Batch size: 5 gallons
O.G.: 1.049
IBUs: 12-14

6.6lbs LME Wheat extract
0.85 oz Tettnager hop pellets (4.5%AA), 60 minute addition
WLP300 Hefeweizen Ale yeast

Boil the hops with the extract for 60 minutes. Chill quickly to pitching temps and add yeast starter. This beer should ferment out rather quickly and be ready for the bottle within 10-12 days if your yeast was fresh.

You can go from brewing to drinking with this one in about 3 weeks.

For variation, you can steep in some light crystal malts, or some American Victory malt if you want a more complex malt character. I’d suggest you stick with the base recipe, at least for a first pass to see how the flavors evolve. The key difference in this beer brewer to brewer will be the brand of Wheat LME you purchase, they all have different color ratings, and different wheat to base malt ratios. So maybe some experimentation will be needed with different brands if the beer isn’t exactly what you are looking for.

Remember that even though the recipe is simple, be vigilant with your fermentation process to get the right flavor profile.

Brew on!

Other Wheat Beer Recipes – Click on a link below and continue to brew on:

Orange Wheat Beer Recipe

American Wheat Ale Recipe

Belgian White Ale Recipe

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11 Comments

  1. Matt

    I am having a difficult time finding tettnager hops. could I use glacier as a substitution with similar results?

  2. Short answer: German Spalt, Czech Saaz, and Santiam are good substitutes for Tettnanger. (Santiam may be easier to find since it’s new and not well known). I think Glacier is more fruity/less spicy than Tettnanger.

    Some extraneous information:

    When I looked at information about Glacier hops, the sources said US Tettnang would be a good substitution. The opposite was not true.

    I believe the “er” at the end of Tettnanger is indicative of the German grown version of this hop variety….so it probably has a slightly but detectably different flavor/aroma profile than it’s US counterpart.

    Just from my experience, I think that Glacier hops would not fit the recipe. I am not saying you’d make bad beer…just wouldn’t have the same flavor profile.

  3. Erik

    I know I’m pretty late on this and would like to know how the batch turned out, but I wanted to ask if maybe hallertau hops would be better, since they have a lower alpha acid content. Am I incorrect in saying that a true hefeweizen has little or no hop aroma and only the mildest hops should be used for “antiseptic” purposes? I am only a beginning homebrewer and only ask because I just ordered ingredients to make a honey hefeweizen and only plan on using 1oz of hallertau for bittering.

    Additionally, does anyone have any thoughts on using honey in the boil as well as a priming sugar?

  4. Erik

    By the way, here is the recipe I intend to use:

    3.3 lbs. Gold Malt extract 3.3 lbs. Wheat Malt Extract 1/2 lb Vienna Malt Grain, 1/2 lb Wheat Malt Grain 1oz. Hallertau Select Hops for bittering Bavarian Weizen 3056 Yeast and priming sugar (or honey).

  5. Clamwacker

    I’ve had some luck with Cascade hops in Hefeweizens. They lend a very mellow aroma and almost no bitterness, but I like my malty flavor in this style.

    Also, Wyeast’s 3068 Weihenstephan Weizen is amazing for this style. The banana and clove aromas are wonderful. The only problem I’m having is getting the color right, but I suspect I will have to completely change my malts for that. I’m using Cooper’s LME, 3.31lbs wheat and 3.31lbs pale/light. Pretty basic brew, but it’s fun for a relaxed brewday.

  6. Rob

    Erik,

    I recently made a honey hefeweizen and it turned out great. I plan on making it again with a little more hoppiness to it next time. I used honey for the full boil and used .75 oz tettnanger for the boil and .25 oz tettnenger for flavoring at 10 minutes with 6.6lbs of wheat LME. Everyone who tried it commented that there was a little bit of a sweet character on the back end of it but couldn’t specifically identify it as honey.

  7. Zen

    Hey Erik, how much honey did you use?

  8. Tim

    How much water did you use to start your boil? I’m assuming 2-3 gallons?

  9. Tim!
    Yeah, in the past I used a three gallon pot so I was boiling 2-2.25 gallons.
    If I was in that situation again, I’d boil with only a third of my extract, do the hop additions, then I’d add the rest of the extract late with 15 minutes to go to sanitize it.
    That might even allow you to boil 2.5 gallons in a 3 gallon pot because of reduced boil over.
    If you brew it let us know how it came out. Thanks for bringing this one up again with a comment. I might brew this one up myself soon its so simple.

  10. Tim

    I was thinking a 3 gallon boil with the full extract & hops for an hour. A friend is coming over Saturday for his first homebrew, so nothing overly complex. What do you think the benefits are to splitting up the LME? I might do 50% wheat & 50% light malt extract. Any thought prior to Saturday morning would be appreciated.

  11. Chris Sullivan

    I actually am brewing a tradition Hefeweizen to send to Germany to my relatives over there for them to try. I wanted to follow a Northwest ingredient recipe with the Weihanstephaner yeast.
    They did not have any Hallertauer at the LHBS so I used Mt. Rainer hops, which are a nice hybrid. I used US grains as well.
    As soon as I know how it turned out, I will post again, with the recipe.
    As far as I know, Mt. Rainer is a fairly new hop variety including parents in the German Noble Hops family.
    – Chris

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