Episode: 4493
Title: HPR4493: HPR Beer Garden 4 - Weissbier
Source: https://hub.hackerpublicradio.org/ccdn.php?filename=/eps/hpr4493/hpr4493.mp3
Transcribed: 2025-11-22 15:00:57

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This is Hacker Public Radio Episode 4493 for Wednesday the 22nd of October 2025.
Today's show is entitled, HBR Beer Garden for Weissbeard.
It is part of the series' beverages.
It is hosted by Kevvie and is about 28 minutes long.
It carries a clean flight.
The summary is, Kevvie and Dave talk about Weissbeard.
Hello and welcome to the HBR Beer Garden Episode 4.
I am Kevvie and joined as always by Dave, how are you today, Dave?
I am very well indeed. Thank you, Kevvie.
Looking forward to this one. This is going to be nice.
Just for clarity, these may get released slightly later just because of the way
HBR schedule works out for us.
But at time of recording these next two episodes,
we promise we'll be recording October.
And you can't think beer and October without what Dave?
I think you're referring to October Fest.
Yes, I'll give that away.
And no, we have got Weissbeard and Dave had the obligation of doing homework for this episode.
So what did you learn about Weissbeard?
I had a little bit of confusion over this because I thought the Weissbeard meant white beer.
And then someone told me, no, it actually means wheat beer.
And then in my research, it actually means both.
That's exactly what it means.
Weiss is German for white.
So wheat beer or Weissbeard, or whatever you want to call it,
it's very, very many names depending on where you are.
It's what's called a top fermented beer.
Now, I did do some research into this to try and understand what that meant.
And I got nowhere.
It did try and explain to me what the difference between the top fermented and the bottom
fermented beer is.
And all I can tell you is that there are only a small number of breweries
in the world that still use the top fermented beer brewing method.
But it's something to do with how the mash is removed from the brew in order to use for the next
batch or something. I haven't got a clue. That's basically what it comes down to.
Anyway, but the point of a wheat beer, it is brewed with a large proportion of wheat compared
to the amount of barley.
So there are two main varieties of wheat beer.
There's the German Weisenbeard, or Weissbeard, as we know.
And there's also the Belgian wheat beer.
Now, there are some other varieties as well, including Ghosts, which is very often a sour brew,
very, very fruity, very, very tart, which I've had a few of.
Not a huge fan, I must admit. But yeah, the Weissbeard and the Weitzbeard are definitely the
two main ones. So the German one, the Weissbeard, uses at least 52% of wheat to barley malt.
And it results in a light-colored top fermenting beer.
Weitzbeard by comparison uses flavorings, like coriander or orange peel.
But the Belgian white beers are often made with unmalted wheat, as opposed to the Weissbears,
which is why you end up with the slightly different colorings.
The reason that Weissbeard and Weitzbeard are termed Weitzbears is because wheat and white,
as words, have the same etymological root.
So they're effectively derived from the same word in most German languages, including English, in fact.
In terms of how Weitzbeard or Weitzbeard is known throughout the world, there are different variations
of it. So we've got Weissbeard or just Weiss, as it's often known, that is mostly used in southern
Germany, Bavaria, and also in Austria. In Western and Northern Germany, as well as Switzerland,
they call it Weisenbeard, whereas Weisen is actually German for wheat, as opposed to Weiss,
which is German for white. I don't know why they do it that way. I'm sure they have their reasons.
Then there's the heifer Weiss, or the heifer Weisen. Now heifer is the German word for yeast,
and the difference between a Weissbeard and a heifer Weiss, or a Weisen, or a heifer Weisen,
is it adds the yeast as part of the conditioning process, which means that the beer itself is
unfiltered and may well contain sediment in the bottle as well. Conversely, crystal Weiss or
crystal Weisen, German for crystal, obviously, is where the Weissbeard has been filtered, so it's the
opposite of a heifer Weisen or a heifer Weiss. Then of course you've got your dunkel Weiss,
or a dunkel Weisen, which is a darker version of the wheat beer, of course,
dunkel-meaning dark in German. You can also get a Weisenbock, which is the box style.
Now I'm not entirely sure what the box style is. I know I like it, but I'm not entirely sure what
it is, and I'm sure that's probably a style that we will cover in a future episode. I've already
mentioned Wittbeard, which is the Belgian style of wheat beer, and also beer blanche, which is
the French language name for wheat beer, literally white beer. Now I've had the beer blonde before,
but I think that's more of a largar style of beer rather than a wheat one.
And there's not really a lot more I can tell you about that. Typically, the heifer Weissens
typically have around 4.9 to 5.6 alcohol by volume. The dunkel Weissens and the box style
are usually somewhere between 7 and maybe 9.5 to 10%. The heifer Weissens, which is not one that we're
going to be doing this time around, but we may do it in the future, actually is very, very low
business in comparison to other rails, because it doesn't, it's not particularly hoppy.
But what my research does not tell me is what the typical ABV is for a straight
vise beer. And for that, I'm going to cheat and look at my bottle. It says five.
That's pretty much it as far as the vise beer is concerned. There's a lot more information
about the actual brewing process and where it came from in history. But I didn't go into too
much detail about that, unfortunately. Do you mind if I add a wee bit of detail to your history?
I don't. Because there was just one thing that I didn't want to go too deep in because I knew you
were doing the research for this. But I did read something that was quite interesting.
Wheat beer, that we know it, the German white wheat beer, that's what I was purely focusing on.
Although they say it's about 4,000 years old, the German wheat beer of the style, roughly
closer to 500 years old. And at the time, it was considered very controversial because it was
seen as wheat was to be used and needed from bread making. So it was controversial to have it in
beer. And what was quite interesting was from 1567, the use of wheat was actually forbidden
throughout Bavaria because the Duke outbreak the fifth of Bavaria, outlawed wheat beer,
deeming it a useless drink that neither nourishes nor gives strengths, but only encourages drunkenness.
That's fun. Well, yeah, I wouldn't disagree too much. But however, it was outlawed then
until 1602 when he died without an ear. And the right was reverted to Duke Maximilian.
So there you go. That was just that wee bit. I thought, I like that wee, that we stilly on it.
So there was a time when it was actually outlawed in Germany, which seems out on it given it's very
German. Interesting. So the information that I've got doesn't mention any of that.
The information I've got was between two different websites, but the one I'm reeling on most is
from erdinger.de. Oh, right. It's okay. Yes, I was going to mention that Erdinger is one of the
four largest. Well, and hence the reason I could buy this in Stornelly. Erdinger. Spoiler alert.
Yes. Well, no, it's just because I'm actually thirsty. I want to get on with this.
Fair enough. Fair enough. So we've got Erdinger. And it's Erdinger.
Weissbier. No surprise there. Does it actually save very much? Not enough a lot. Erdinger Weissbier
with fine yeast, wheat beer, bottle fermentation, which probably tells me there's going to be
stuff in this bottle, if it's still fermenting. That's it. Trustee Broten bottle opener.
We're both avid. We are not sponsored by Broten, but if they would like to send us beer,
I'm not going to object. Yes. Now a crate of old jock will be really nice, thank you.
As soon as I've opened that, I've no input on my nose. The smell of yeast. Oh, that's lovely.
Well, let's go for the poor.
Now I did read that you must stop pouring this just before you empty it and then swirl it.
And then swirl it. Swirl it and then pour it in. Oh, because apparently the yeast is actually
a feature of this beer. Oh, that's just the Erdinger, not vice-based in general.
I eventually down the Erdinger website a minute ago.
Oh, okay. Let me see if it says anything on this one about it.
Well, certainly. That is going to lovely. Head in that. Can I get a flake, please?
Oh, my goodness. Yes. I think that definitely justifies a flake and possibly even
like a little bit of chocolate sauce or something.
Maybe some sprinkles. Yep. So we've got definitely got a lovely pouring head.
And tell you one thing, that's not dissolving right quickly, like a lot of things can.
And that was not an aggressive pour either. That's staying nicely.
Let's have a wee sample. So out. Oh, yeah, there's more flavors now.
From the nose. Well, I'm definitely getting like a, you can smell it sweet, just sweetness to that.
Not a falsely sweet. Yeah, he's still there.
I've subtle fruitiness to that, but I can't identify it.
Still plant full head there. It's not. And it's very, very hazy as well.
Oh, yeah, yeah, really nice. That's actually a lot more carbonate than I was expecting.
It's quite bubbly. There's something in that back end. There's like a fruit.
It's like a tiny amount of fruit, but it's present. Like I kind of subtle lemon peel, orange peel,
that kind of not full on orange juice, but the peel of it, same old bitter.
Yeah, it's got a lovely, eusty, bready flavour.
Hey, you can definitely tell it's a wheat beer all right.
I'm not getting much in the way of hopes or maltyness, anything like that.
Well, I don't think you're all supposed to get much in the way of hopes.
Well, no, I'm just looking, I'm just thinking of, you know, just a standard beer.
There's wheat and there's yeast, which make for a very subtle flavouring, but it's nice,
but I mean, you'd have to start a night on that. There is no way I would recommend anybody
have anything at all, and then go on to that, because I think you just find a blend.
But when you actually enjoy it on its own, there's a bready, slightly bready,
eusty, wheatiness to it. And then there's just that, oh, so subtle, fruitiness on the back end.
Yep. That's nice. Although it's just a shame October festivals in October,
because in Scotland, that's full on winter mode.
Yes. I think that would be incredibly good at a barbecue in the summer.
Very nice. Would you say it was refreshing?
Yes. Oh, it's okay. Yeah, it's light enough to be refreshing.
I think they've maybe tried to try to get the Lager drinkers a wee bit by putting that much
carbonation in it. It doesn't feel natural. You know, it's not a fizzy bomb, like a Lager can
would be, but it's fizzy all I was expecting. But some of that would have occurred in the bottle,
would it not? Yes, as a result of the, well, it's still fermented, yes.
Yes. What does that mean that a bottle, a live bottle like this would improve up to a point
and then degrade in time? I'm not a hunter. I think we'd just stop fermenting.
After a certain time. As long as, no, wait a minute. This is the one where you would really want
to make sure, because the bottle is not totally, when you actually see it, the bottle is not that dark.
Yeah. So it is a kind of light greenie brownie and kind of colour. You wouldn't start to have a
mind, I think. But that's a brown, that's almost, it's not quite a, a new key bottle, but it's
certainly darker. It's the one where you would have to make sure it's kept and covered.
Right. I think, especially with this little being live and with the bottle not being dark,
enough in my mind, sunlight would kill that. It would turn skunky. That's the only thing that
I would be really about. But it wouldn't keep on going. It wouldn't keep on getting stronger
and stronger, put it that way. It would just keep on developing the taste. Somebody once told me
when they were brewing beers that before they stuck the crown back on the top of the bottle,
they were told just to sprinkle a small amount of granulated sugar into the top.
And apparently, it kind of keeps it awake. It keeps on. Yeah, I just put a half a spoon
into each bottle. If I'm doing it or I put some, I'll just put some, I've got a keg as well.
So if I'm doing that, I'll just add some sugar in at the end. And the other thing is, see if the
beer is just, I'm not talking about it's consiled, it's consiled, you've ruined it. It's done.
But if it's like that kind of stage, where it's just starting to go and it's like,
whatever it is, I think it's going a bit flat almost, but it's not totally dead. You can actually
sprinkle a bit of salt in it, in the pour of the beer. It's like a wee bit of salt and it will
bring it back. But there's only a small window like, you know, it'll give you an extra couple of
days. I'll drink it. Right. Interesting. I went for erdinger. So what did you go for?
Well, I went for a brand I'd never heard of before, purely because it was the only one they had
in Tesco. Sorry, Morrison's Apologies that was of that ilk. And it's a Franz Franziskana.
Never actually seen that one before. Well, actually, that's the one we always have in
Storkier until I went for a bite. It's either that or erdinger and I was looking for that.
But I'm glad I didn't get it now because I went for erdinger. Yes, yes. So yeah, Franziskana
vice-peer from Bavaria. I presume Franziskana is the brewery, brewed and bottled by
dross. I have no idea what that says. Spartan Franziskana brawl in Munich.
Yeah, so it's 5%. There's no tasting notes on the bottle which is slightly unusual. I would
expect it to be. No, it's the same one. Absolutely not. So I've said something.
Other than seeing fine yeast wheat beer, there's nothing else on this.
Now then, this is slightly problematic because if you look on the front, it says vice-peer.
If you look on the back, it says heath of vice-peer, which I was not expecting, probably because I couldn't
see where I was reading glasses on. But I don't care. I'm going to try anyway. So yeah, it comes in a
nice brown bottle. The liquid inside is quite hazy and there is some form of sediment at the bottom,
which will end up going into the glass, I'm sure. So the aroma from this is not blown me away
as much as yours did for you, clearly. But it is the very distinctive vice-peer aroma. I'm not
getting much through the bottle, no. So I'm going to pour this out and try and see what it's like
from there. So that's... Oh, that's slightly lively. Am I going to get it all in the glass?
No, you can hear the fizzy, so you can almost see through it. It's subtle. It really is subtle.
It's nice. It's what I was hoping and expecting, but it is still very subtle for a vice-peer. I'm
kind of familiar with Erdinger and its ilk, but I've never had this brewery before. I'm not really
getting much. I'll be perfectly honest. Not a lot coming from the foam either. Let's give this a
galpancy. I'm not sure whether to be disappointed or mightily impressed, because there's not a lot
to it. There's nothing that smacks you in the face. There's no overpowering anything about this
at all. Now, again, as we said earlier on, heifervice isn't a bitter ale, by the way it's brewed.
So I think that might be the principal difference between the one I've got and the one that you've
just... Erdinger, you've just had. If I was expecting this to hit me in the face and say hello,
then yeah, I think I would be disappointed. Having said that, this is incredibly good,
because it's not watery. It's subtle. There's not a lot on the nose at all. You've kind of got that.
It's like a citrusy... There's something acidic that sits over the top of a vise spear.
I don't know if I'm explaining that correctly, but I would have expected in the flavour a lot more
of the acidity and the fruity flavours than I'm actually getting. But I think the mere fact that
this is quite... I'm going to say mild. Let's just go with mild. It is quite mild in flavour. It's
quite mild in aroma. It's got a really good mouthfeel. It's quite smooth. It doesn't have
for watery feel at all. Yet neither is it chewy. It's that nice in between, unnecessarily watery,
and you need to spoon for it. So I actually really, really like this. And having... Being familiar
with Erdinger and its elk, I think I probably prefer this style, the heifer vise and style,
than I do just the straight vise spear, which is probably controversial.
Well, it's funny, because I've had that one a few times, but I've only actually
logged it once and untapped, and I was just looking at this. And what I had put down was that...
I don't know if you're getting any of this, but I had put down that after an initial very subtle
flavour. I put down there was a strong note of banana in it. Did you get that? Yes, I'm getting the
banana. And then I'd followed with a slight kind of... I'd say there's another flavour,
that's something like cardamom. I'm not getting cardamom, and I like cardamom.
I think going by the two, this is nice, it's pleasant, but one thing I'll say is, it lacks depth
the Erdinger. It's definitely a beer that's been made for the masses. Yes, you can tell the
difference, it's not a lagger, certainly. But I would say this one's maybe... I'm getting the
wheat, there's a sweetness from that wheat as well. I'm getting almost bready, yeasty flavour, it's nice.
And there's that subtle hint that's just teasing me as if to say, I'm here, but you can't quite
edit to find me in the back end of us. Like I said, that kind of orange peel, lemon peel,
but it's subtle, it's just barely there. It's nice, but it's not as nice as the one you've got,
which has actually got a bit more flavoring to it. Does that make sense? And no, it does. It does.
But what you're describing is very much what I've got here. I'm not one thing I'm not getting
as anything like banana, and I'm not getting that spice that I've found I liked in that. I put down
a swell in one of my comments, not on an tap, I was looking at what the other notes I'd been making,
is that that one reminded me more of whole garden? Oh, I've not had how gardening years.
I think I'd be happy to drink that in the summer. I think this would be a great barbecue beer
personally. And it would probably be a great beer if I was to go to October Fest,
because obviously you don't really want to be drinking a 9% don't kill if you were the last all day.
Yeah, as far as a rating goes, I'm enjoying it. Do I love it?
A lot of this time of year, but then again, maybe it's not fair, because I'm sitting here
waiting a padded shirt with the heating on. It's cold. I would probably give this maybe about
a six and a half to seven other 10. I think right now I'm leaning towards a six and a half.
I think if it was a summer and it was water, I'd be seeing seven sevens and a half. So I think this
is one that's for me very much a summer beer. I'm just drinking at the wrong time. Interesting.
I think for this one, I would be leaning towards seven. I cheat on this. I just double whatever it is,
I raise it on on tap. So I'm giving it a three and a half on on tap, which would translate seven
out of 10. If I think I'm doing that, I'd just say, I want to go seven and a half,
because I do enjoy it. I would seek this out again. I wouldn't cross the street for it,
necessarily. But if it was there, if it was available and I saw the bottle, I'll have one of those
please. Like I said, the flavours are there, definitely getting the banana. Looking at some of the
chemical elements that make up the flavour. Apparently the vise beer and heifer vices tend to have
a clove flavour. Now I love clove. I love the taste of cloves. I've not gained that from this at all.
I would expect that to be quite ever-pouring. No, definitely not. I mean, clove is distinctive and
I'm not getting that only for this. But I suppose one thing, we are probably doing vise
beer a bit of a disservice, because what do we both have? That's a bit of a ambiguous question.
No, but what I mean is for it, when front of us, we've got big, big brewery, international brands.
There's probably people here listening to this from Germany yelling, saying, no, that's not the
good one to try. You want to try this one? The problem was with it being German, we have to take
what we get. Yes, or we have to have it imported. Or we have to have it imported, which is
dashed expensive these days. Well, more expensive for you than it is for me, sir. Actually, no,
no, believe it or no. No. It's a British company that rip us off for Trilvich, the island. See,
when you tend to get from mainland Europe, right? They just have a British postage. Right, it's
they're not, they're not that discerning. No, they don't seem to be, which is, which is good
in one sense and annoying another. Yes, yes. But just following off from what you just said,
Kevin, if there is somebody in Germany sitting in their couch or their car screaming and shouting
at us, because we don't know what we're doing, record an episode and prove us wrong, educators.
Yes, please do. Absolutely. What a vice beer should be. What kind of vice beers should we be going
for? Should we be exploring the different varieties and strains of wheat beers? How we
done these ones, the disservice and how we describe them, even how we've tasted and how we
sampled them, maybe, record an episode for Hacker Public Radio and tell us. Please.
Absolutely. And speaking of the subject of tell us, we actually have some feedback.
So the first bit of feedback I got was from Ken Fallon and this was live on the HPR community
news. So if you've not listened to that, you can listen to that. Actually, I was recorded live.
And the comment I got back was that he's absolutely loving the series and
he particularly loves the sound effects and the fact that we put the glasses up and empty the balls
in front of the microphone and things like that. So actually, I didn't know if people would find
that boring or not, but that's good. He does say he says it's very dashed contagious. It makes
you want to go and grab a beer. So that's cool. Yeah, so that was the first bit of feedback that I got.
The other one was by Paul Jewel and this was through mastodon. Now, this wasn't to both
was directed. So that's why you didn't get it. It was just yarning to me. But he says loving the
beer episodes on HPR, by the way, you and Dave are making a great show series. Even if I do disagree
with your views on IPA. So yeah, just in case you didn't get that from my last episode,
yeah, I'm not the biggest fan of IPA. I have been validated. Thank you, Paul.
Yes. So if you do wish to actually get in touch with us, then please do contact.
Best ways actually to leave a comment on the show. If you actually want to get in touch with us
and messages, then please do leave a comment. If you're not really keen on leaving a comment,
but you're on mastodon, then you can contact us. I'm at Kavi and Dave is at the lovebug
and we're both on mastodon.me.uk. So that's the other way you can. And of course, as another third
way is you want to contact us with feedback as Dave already said, record an episode and uploaded
to HPR, because like we said, especially with more localized beers, there aren't many Scottish
brewers that, especially microbreweries and things, that brew German beers. There are some,
there's not a heck of a lot. And I dare say it's similar down in England. Is that right, Dave?
I would say so, yes. Yes. So then, I'll say chin chin. And join us tomorrow for another.
An exciting episode of Hacker Public Radio.
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