Is it Hefeweizen or is it American-style wheat beer??
Wheat beers vary dramatically, and beer drinkers who prefer their wheat beers a certain way know what to look for on the label. Calling a beer “hefeweizen” is very different from calling it “wheaten ale” (as one popular Northwest brewery likes to call their beer) or from calling it merely “summer wheat” or some other generically inoffensive and uncontroversial term. Let’s look first at what the term “hefeweizen” means to a beer lover… The most popular and widespread style of wheat beer is the Bavarian weizen (or weissbier) style. Sweet and refreshing, the beer is noted for lots of yeast-produced aromas and flavors, such fruitiness or clove spiciness, aggressive carbonation, and cloudiness (although some brands are filtered). The beer is brewed using a blend of about 60% wheat and 40% pale malted barley and a special multiple-strain yeast. This is a normal density, normal alcohol beer (about 12 Plato with 4 to 5% alcohol). “Hefe” means yeast in German, and “weizen” means wheat. Put th
