Elderweiss - Hefeweissen

Elderweiss was conceived as a bit of a rebellion form the norm. I wanted to brew a foreign style of beer with specialist yeast and do something that was a bit different to what had been done before in terms of monthly specials as well as our core range. So a cloudy 5% wheat beer then!

Along with the mix of Styrian hops at the end of the boil I also opted to go for hefty dose of elderflower (also known as holunderblüten) syrup too to give it a more floral character. This really did help balance out the archetypal wheat beer flavours of banana and cloves formed during fermentation by the special hefeweissen yeast that we propagated up from a small vial in the pictured vessel.

Despite the stress of step mashing on our kit to help break down the proteins and beta-glucans from the large amount of wheat in the grist this really was an enjoyable beer to brew. The end result was also pretty decent especially given the only other time I had made a weissbier was in my Parent's kitchen whilst still at university!

Introduction

Hi I'm Oliver Kitson and I'm the Brewmaster at Dorset Brewing Company's Jurassic Brewhouse.

I thought about starting a brewer's blog back in January and its taken 6 months but I'm now finally up and running. I'm going to be focusing on experimentation with beer and doing things that are out of the ordinary in terms of the day-to-day running of a brewery and beer production. So this will include things like monthly specials, beer festivals and making other beery creations.

Plenty of other foodie types are embracing blogging and social media and it really is time to get on board, so here goes.