Smithworks Hefeweizen

Smithworks Hefeweizen

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Brewed by Smithhavens Brewing Company / Smithworks Brewing Company

Peterborough, Ontario, Canada

Style:  Hefeweizen

5% Alcohol by Volume

12 International Bittering Units

Availability of this beer is unknown

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On its home turf in Bavaria, a properly brewed wheat ale is usually referred to as a weissbier (German for “white beer) or a weizenbier (“wheat beer”), while in North America this beer is called by its now less common German name of hefeweizen (literally “yeast wheat”). The German Beer Purity Law defines weizenbier as any top-fermented brew that is made with at least 50 percent wheat. A special yeast strain is used to produce the beer's unique character. There are other types of wheat beers that have a much different flavour profile than the Southern German wheat beers. In North America a wheat beer would likely have different yeast and more hop flavours. A Hefeweizen should not be confused with the Belgian Wit (white) beer. Although the Wit beer has wheat malt, it also contains orange peel and spices that produces a different beer style. Weissbier stands apart from all other beer styles primarily because of one difficult-to-describe signature flavour, which has been variably compared to the taste of clove, banana, nutmeg, vanilla, apple and even bubblegum. As for adjectives, phenolic, spicy, tart, aromatic, fruity, complex and crisp have all been pressed into service to translate the weissbier palate experience into words. Wheat beer has apparently been brewed in Bavaria (and probably in neighbouring Bohemia) since the Bronze Age. Proof of this is a 2,800-year old earthenware fermentation amphora discovered in 1934 in a Celtic tribal burial mound near the small village of Kasendorf, outside Kulmbach, in northern Bavaria. The amphora can now be seen in the Kulmbach Beer Museum. Scientists have determined that the residues in the amphora are from dark wheat beer.