Beer Forum

I've seen a lot of difference of opinion on the old 'higher temps more banana, lower temps more clove' thought process, so I thought it was worth a revisit. I recently brewed a dunkelweizen with Wyeast Weinstephaner yeast at 67 degrees, and although I smelled a wonderful amount of banana during the ferment, I am left with only clove in the final product.

Soooo, I see many folks favor fermenting this at cooler temps around 60-65 degrees to get more balance between the banana and clove, as well as the 'higher temp for more banana'. I am going to give it a go with the same yeast, but I am debating whether to ferment warmer or cooler for more banana flavor/aroma.

Anyone have practical experience to share on the topic?

I don't particularly care for the banana so I always ferment at 65-66° with 3068 to emphasize the clove. Seems to give me the balance I want.

Wayne

I too do not like banana in my dunkelweiss. i used the weinstephan yeast at 62-64 or so.

I have the same question, Booty Shaker. I do like a little banana in my hefeweizens, just enough to suggest that "banana bread" character, but I'm far from achieving it. In addition to tinkering with fermentation temps, I've recently added some Cara- malts to my recipes in an effort to provide a touch of residual sweetness that my earlier attempts were missing.

I just kegged a dunkelweizen, which I fermented around 64dF. It's difficult to say before conditioning, but my early review is that I'm closer to the malt profile I'm looking for, but still lacking banana. Thus, with the hefeweizen I brewed yesterday, I'm trying an experiment: one carboy is fermenting at 62-64, while the other is at 70-72. While it's the same wort and the same yeast slurry, the experiment isn't perfect; pitching rates and aeration were only approximately the same for the two carboys, as my volume measurements aren't very precise. Likewise, my water-bath temperature control isn't to-the-degree perfect either, but I did wake up this morning to find both carboys fermenting strongly, with measured water-bath temps close to on target: 64dF and 72dF.

When all is said and done in a few weeks, I'll post my results. I was never a big hefeweizen fan until I got to drink several brewery-fresh examples last summer in Bavaria and neighboring Salzburg. I'd love to recapture some of that Germanic magic at home. By the way, I'm using WLP300.

Sounds good Pete. I think your experiment will at least tell us what, if any differences there are with the different ferm temps. I will be recreating the beer next week, and only changing the ferm temp variable, changing it to a cooler temp initially, then ramping up a bit near the end.

I just tasted my first bottle of Dunkleweizen done with WLP300 at 62 degrees. Just a little bit of bananas, and a good amount of clove. I like the balance.

I made a cracked out "dunkel" last weekend and just sampled (minutes ago). I used 3068, OG was 1.069 been blowing furiously for a week and now is @ 1.013. I went nuts on the heat as I am shooting for a "banana split" I ended up starting out @ 72 for 2 days and up to 74 she went. My fermentor and the sample smell like a banana smoothie lol. I wish I had gotten more chocolate without the roast/smoke but it's not carbed yet we'll see how it ends up. I am thinking of adding 0.5-1 lbs lactose to one of the 2 cornies (his/hers), I know this endeavor sounds completely but I hate wheat beers for the most part and wanted to come up with something interesting (off the wall) enough to motivate me, and two if the ladies like this 2 glasses and the panties drop.


EDIT: If this were in a traditional hefe I would be ok with it (for a wheat beer), I likely wouldn't have kicked it up to 74 if it were a more traditional wheat beer more like 70-72ish if you want to step or 72 for the whole duration compared to my bananabomination.

So this beer has been on gas a week and carbed up quite nicely. It's got some banana but not over the top. Not sure if I would brave going up a whole lot more than where it fermented honestly.