Hefeweizen, first all grain batch

Programing the Braumeister

Ingredients

• 2,5 kg (Pale Ale malt 1kg 7 EBC - Weyermann)
• 2,5 kg (Hvetemalt Blond 3 EBC - Weyermann)
• 2 x WLP380 - Hefeweizen IV Ale Yeast
• 55g Hallertauer Mittelfrueh 4.5%

Adding the grain,
start mashing at 50°C

The malt was pre crushed from the shop, the problem was that I had to order 3 kg of each. Leaving me with lots of the finest crush left in the bag. Maybe this contributing to low OG as you will see later.

Three days earlier I started making a Yeast starter. I started the brew day by taking it out and decanting it. Just leaving me with a yeast slurry. I left it on the bench with the lid on to adopt pitching temperature.

Just after the pump
has been turned on

Mashing

Mashing steps I used.

1. 50°C - Start
2. 52°C - 0 min
3. 63°C - 15 min
4. 73°C - 35 min
5. 78°C - 15 min

Draining the grain

Everything went in at 50°C and I just had to press start, and the machine just sat there and went through the different steps.

After the mash program ended, I had to lift up the malt pipe as shown in the picture. And probe it with a wooden spoon to make the wort drain better. I decided to skip rinsing the grain, maybe not the smartest thing to skip.

Boiling

Adding hops

When boil started the foam built up, but settled before it boiled over. I just read about a tip to prevent boil over, and it was to have a water spray bottle handy, to spray on the foam to make it collapse. The foam should be reduced as soon as we are done with the hot break.

I was going to boil for 80 minutes. With hops added at 15g when 60 minutes remaining, and 15g when 10 minutes remaining.

Cooling

Cooling the wort

Now it was time to test out my submersible chiller that I described in this post. I almost had an accident here, the water coming out of the chiller was very hot, close to boiling temperature. And the cheap tube I had used for leading water through it was collapsing on me and blocking the water flow. This resulted in high pressure on the garden host system, and on the poor quality tubes. Next time I think I will dip the chiller inn slower.

Checking OG 1.040

The wort was cooled down very quickly, and I actually got it to drop a bit too low.

I left the wort in the boiler for a little bit, to let the sediments and proteins from the cold break fall to the bottom.

Next step was to let it free flow down into the fermentation bucket.

I swirled my yeast slurry around a bit before dumping it all into the fermenter.

I had tested aeration using a compressor from my workshop. This worked great since I was able to adjust the pressure on the compressor. I aerated the wort for 30 minutes.

Last bit was to put the airlock on. Filling it with Star San.

Fermenting

Testing aeration

The fermentation was visible after just a few hours. And FG ended on just below 1.010. This should give us a Alc/Vol% close to 4.