Danstar munich yeast / step mash

[mr hoppy]

I accidentally got this recently and was thinking of using it in a smoked weiss.

I saw a thread over on Jim's where a step mash with a rest at 45 degrees was recommended to get a weiss flavour profile.

Anyone tried this, or have any experiences to share about munich yeast or step mashing weiss beers?

[Garry]

I bought a Brewferm Weizen all grain kit but I haven't used it yet. The instructions for the mash schedule say:

40°C for 2 min.
52°C for 10 min.
63°C for 30 min.
72°C for 20 min.
78°C for 10 min.

And that's the reason I haven't done it yet! But it might be of use to you?

Did you smoke the malt? How'd it go?

[mr hoppy]

You can definitely doing a single infusion on a weizen. It's a long time since I did a weizen but it was a single infusion last time and it worked pretty ok.

A step mash or decoction mash is supposed to be more authentic and a rest around 45 -50 degrees is supposed to promote clovey / banana flavours (which Munich yeast isn't supposed to be great at producing) so I thought I'd give it a try now that I'm using a gas boiler. But I'd imagine you'd be fine doing a single infusion at 63 - 65 degrees.

I did have a go at smoking some malt. I did a kilo the other day and I'm going to do another 2 at the weekend. It seemed to work ok. I think it stayed below 50 degrees the whole way through and there's a definite smokey taste off the malt - although at the moment it reminds me of kippers more than anything!

[Garry]

I was thinking a single infusion would be fine but now you've confirmed it

I meant to ask you how were you smoking the malt? Is it in a barbeque?

And apologies for derailing your thread

[mr hoppy]

No probs, Garry. I'll give a lash anyway if no one advises me different.

Yep i used a little kettle BBQ.

I basically copied this video and MAF's helpful blog post on his bog oak smoking experience.

I used a couple of briquettes to get a bit of heat going and once the wood was smouldering I removed them so the wood didn't go on fire. Then I stacked 3 old Roses tins with the bottoms cut out on top of the grill with a splatter screen in between each one and the malt in the top. I'd soaked the malt for 20 - 30 mins beforehand, smoked for 15 - 20 minutes and then dried in the oven for an hour at 50 degrees. I'm hoping that keeping everything fairly cool means I'll still have good efficiency but shure who knows.

It was a funny experience because I didn't really know what I was doing - it reminded me a lot of the first time I did a brew!

[mr hoppy]

Back on topic, anyone any thoughts on this yeast - or step mashing wheat beers?

[johnrm]

I did a brew with Blunt at one stage, single temp mash with WLP380.
All clove and banana, a super beer.

What temp control have you on your mash?

[mr hoppy]

I've a gas ring and an aluminium boiler so as long as I keep an eye on it I should be able to control the mash temperature fairly well. I've done it before and as long as I keep an eye on it, it works quite well

The yeast is the catch though - WLP380 is supposed to be the Schneider Weisse strain so I'd want my money back if I didn't get lots of banana and clove.

On the other hand, I've a sachet of Munich sitting in my fridge and I reckon I might as well use it. Now, I've read that it will produce some isoamyl acetate / banana esters and that a mash step at 45 degrees is recommended. As a mash step at 45 degrees is used to promote the production of 4-vinyl guaiacol which is the precursor to clove flavour phenols I'm hoping that it's been recommended for Munich yeast for this reason. Particularly, as a lot of folks who've used it without doing anything fancy haven't been very impressed.

I'm looking at it as an experiment, but I'm just curious to see if anyone else has tried this yeast with a step mash geared toward the production of phenolics.

[irish_goat]

The yeast is the catch though - WLP380 is supposed to be the Schneider Weisse strain so I'd want my money back if I didn't get lots of banana and clove.

Schneider's house strain is descended from Wyeast 3068 (Weihenstephaner) and emphasizes phenol over ester production. If WLP380 is the Schneider strain you should be expecting lots of clovey phenols but less estery banana. I have one in the fridge as well, hoping for good things out of it.

[mr hoppy]

Yep, that's what I love about SW. Not sure if the Danstar stuff is going to deliver, but here goes.

[mr hoppy]

Just to follow this up, I got this brew on the other weekend.

I managed to break all my thermometers before I got to the yeast rehydration stage - so I mixed cooled boiled water and boiling water to try and get 30 - 35 degrees. I think it worked as the jar was not warm to touch. But when I put the yeast in and rehydrated it had all fallen to the bottom after 30 minutes. 

The yeast was in date and as I say I thought the temp was ok, but as it looked like it was DOA I nipped down to the offie and got two bottles of SW which I recultured up overnight which did the trick.

[johnrm]

SouthWest?
SchneiderWeisse?
ShoutyWords?

[mr hoppy]

Schneider Weisse.

I've not used Shouty Words yeast. Any good?

[mr hoppy]

Tasting this now and it definitely tastes the way the smoked malt tasted (who'd have thought?). I'll give home smoking a try again but next time I'll dry smoke all of the malt as there's a slightly funky taste which I got off the wet smoke malt, but not the other.

[mr hoppy]

Transferred this from keg to bottles last weekend and it now tastes smokey in a good way.

Will try again.