Bell's Wheat Six Ale
Bell’s Wheat Project (2005) is an experimental foray into the development of complex flavors in beer.
The Project comprises five new ales, four in series and one specialty strong product.
The first four, Wheat 2, Wheat 4, Wheat 6 and Wheat eight are all made using 55% Wheat (either wholly or mostly malted) and 45% Barley malt.
The barley malt makeup is exactly the same in each of the four and consists of three different malts.
The total amount of grain in each of the four is also exactly the same, so each of them should have a virtually identical original gravity. The type and amount of hops in each of the four is exactly the same. And the processing through the brewhouse and fermentation is also exactly the same. The changing factors between the ales are the composition of the 55% of wheat used and the type and number of yeast strains used. In Wheat 6 the 55% of wheat is made up of six different kinds of wheat malt, and this ale is made with six different yeasts.
Basic Content List for Wheat Six:
Wheats: White, Dark, Toasted sprouts, Torrefied, Red, Caramel
Yeast: WLP500 Trappist, WLP530 Abbey, Wheat Four blend
The Project comprises five new ales, four in series and one specialty strong product.
The first four, Wheat 2, Wheat 4, Wheat 6 and Wheat eight are all made using 55% Wheat (either wholly or mostly malted) and 45% Barley malt.
The barley malt makeup is exactly the same in each of the four and consists of three different malts.
The total amount of grain in each of the four is also exactly the same, so each of them should have a virtually identical original gravity. The type and amount of hops in each of the four is exactly the same. And the processing through the brewhouse and fermentation is also exactly the same. The changing factors between the ales are the composition of the 55% of wheat used and the type and number of yeast strains used. In Wheat 6 the 55% of wheat is made up of six different kinds of wheat malt, and this ale is made with six different yeasts.
Basic Content List for Wheat Six:
Wheats: White, Dark, Toasted sprouts, Torrefied, Red, Caramel
Yeast: WLP500 Trappist, WLP530 Abbey, Wheat Four blend
3.4
169 reviews
Comstock, United States
Community reviews
Bottle... Hazy, red/amber ale with a huge, frothy, off-white head. Maybe a sign of bad things to come... a thick layer of caramel-colored yeast sits atop the liquid. The separation is very cool looking, but unusual as well. The nose is of caramel and flowers with a rumor of mint. Caramel and cocoa flavor. Terrific balance. Medium-bodied and ultra fizzy. Finishes crisp and clean. Thanks to headbanger for the bottle.
12oz bottle- huge amount of carbonation on dark rust body. An aroma of alcohol. Taste of wheat and alcohol. A good tasting beer.
Bottled. Dark hazy orange coloured. Rather weak aroma and flavour. Fruity, sweet and slightly yeasty. Bland.
355ml bottle obtained in a trade with OhioDad, thanks Scott. Batch 7119. Orange-brown in colour, a very slow pour produces a very large pillowy beige head, great retention, lots of lacing. The aroma is of yeast, light bananas, some sourness, bready malts, lemons. The flavour is bready, yeasty, bananas, lots of citrus, light chocolate, earthy, chalky. Very full mouthfeel, medium body, extreme carbonation. FInishes with a long medium bitterness. The high carbonation makes this one filling beer.
Thanks go out to Walt for this beer. Poured a very effervescent hazy burnt copper with a fizzy tan head that dissipated completely. Aroma of light brown sugar and honey wheat bread, sort of faint. Flavor is dry lemony citrus, rye bread, somewhat metallic. Dry metallic finish. Body has stinging carbonation which feels a bit forced. A few sips feel like they’ve given me enough fuel to belch the first paragraph of A Tale of Two Cities. Not really impressed with this one... not as complex or tasty as the four.
Bottle: Copper color, thick head, lots of carbonation, large bubbles. Nose of light belgian notes, citrus, spruce, tangy. The flavor is snappy, tart. Less carbonation would be nice. Decent though. Yeasty! Much richer and flavorful though once the yeast is mixed in.
12 oz bottle: Pours a highly carbonated cloudy brownish/orange with a huge fluffy tan head. Aroma is of wheat, lemon, light caramel and chocolate notes, and lightly spiced. Taste consists of caramel, a rather high wheatiness, light chocolate, and semi-fruity with a bitter sweetness to it. Palate light, bubbly, and sweet. Overall, It’s good, but not great. I’ve had better dunkelweizens than this. If you can get it as a single (like me) try it that way.
A flavour explosion on the palete.Too
much for me.I prefer the 4 ,a tasty
summer beverage.
meh. this was ok. better than the 4. Aroma is chocolate and wheat with a hint of perfume. Flavor is chocolate, wheat, and a tinge of bubblegum flavor with a hint of lemon. word.
12 oz. Bottle. Batch 7119 (?) I picked this up at Blue Max Liquor in Burnsville, MN. The color is a somewhat muddy dark copper with an enormous frothy tan head and some sticky lacing. The nose has loads of caramel and bread dough. The flavor is smooth with lots of malt and spicy notes with a balanced hop bite in the finish.
Batch 7119. I hope it isn’t past its prime. Pours a cloudy reddish orange with a frickin’ massive light orange brown head. Aroma of the usual bananas and clove, wheat, some sour fruits. Quite sour flavor up front, bananas and wheat come into play to a toasted malt, nut, and toast finish. Slightly bitter, overly carbonated
12 oz bottle: mostly clear orangeish brown with a gigantic tan head. Little aroma except a bit of malt and a touch of chocolate. As for flavor, yes, we have no banana. Ok, maybe just a bit. Not much of anything but malt and light hops. Very fizzy and overcarbonated. It foams up in the mouth. Finish is lightly bitter. Bottom line: too carbonated and fizzy, lacks body and flavor.
I wasn’t sure about it at first, but it’s grown on me. Pours with a big head that fades pretty quickly. Has a sweet malty aroma, pretty typical of a wheat. What’s not typical is the appearance. It’s reddish brown, light around the edges but very dark in the middle.
Taste is sweet with hints of banana. Full, thick mouthfeel.
Pour was similiar to Wheat 4...huge infected like head...also was ruddy amber colored...smell is sweet and grassy...something very vegetal and wrong...this is only slightly less atrocious than the Four...fizzy mouthfeel...taste is sweet with some cherries and bananas, with some molded pumpernickel toward the sticky cloying finish...
Poured orange-red with a huge head and some lacing. I really like Bell’s but this wasn’t one of their better ones.
12 oz bottle (batch 7119), 2005, from Bello Vino in Ann Arbor, MI (Dec 2005), served at cellar temperature in a Weihenstephan weizen glass. Muddy amber-copper with suspended, stable sheets of yeast visible in the murk, surmounted by an immense frothy off-white monster head that decays somewhat rapidly leaving slight lacing.....nose predominantly herbal, with mint and tarragon evident at once, faint bananas and bubblegum arriving shortly.....wonderfully full, thick and milk-shake-like mouthfeel, you know it’s Bells it’s so rich and yeasty but never over-thick, with tingly carbonation throughout supporting.....woody dried caramel-vanilla, supple banana-cream and applesauce notes, sourdough and towards the finish tingly bitter herbs....no amount of effort really strengthens the aromatic qualities, but it’s nice to drink and another worthy effort.
Dark copper body with a quickly diminishing head. Very wheaty aroma and flavor, of course, and highly yeasty as well. The aroma is pleasant, filled with wheat and lemons. The flavor is slightly hoppy with notes of caramel to give this beer a little more complexity than your average wheat beer. Highly carbonated, too many bubbles for me to fully enjoy the mouthfeel. Herbal notes are strong in the finish.
Bottle. This one was a genie in the bottle that when uleashed(opened) its head just kept on coming and onto the pour. A mocha colored brew with that unceasing tan head. After it settled, what was left was a very pleasent wheaty, cafe au lait flavor. Some sweetness and no discernable bitterness. Very nice dunkelweizen. Thanks to Styles for the bottle and the whole series of Wheat Ales.
Holy crap, this beer exploded out of the bottle. Most puzzling! With an angles pour, half an inch of liquid at the bottom of my glass and 6 inches of head. I really had to let this settle down to assess the beer. Yellowish dunkelweizen color, completely opaque with a huge loose fluffy head. This is straight up banana/cloves with some tart apple and an underlying honey sweetness. Fizzy to the point of harming the mouthfeel, this beer is big and creamy otherwise with a small amount of viscosity. The flavors are in line with the aromas, though decidedly stronger and a bit more balanced. Less banana/cloves and creamy with more malt sweetness with some bitter alcohol that even becomes alcohol heat. This is the most I’ve enjoyed the flavor of a wheat beer.
This beer is a very dark cloudy orange-brown (not great looking), and it has a HUGE white foamy bubbly head. It just has too much carbonation- so fizzy on the palate, its almost difficult to drink because of this, or at least difficult to enjoy the flavors. It smells pretty good though- fruity, banana, creamy aroma, also cherries and vanilla. It tastes similar but with a touch of caramel and even a bit spicy.
A muddy orange-brown beer with a huge orange head. The aroma is a mixture of wheat and dish-wash water. The flavor is sweet wheaty with notes of caramel, leading to a dry wheaty end.
(12 oz bottle: Obtained 21-Feb-06 in trade with Pailhead, thanks Kevin!) Fairly dark in color, kind of an amber-brown shade, and topped by a very heady and foamy, light-tan cap that shows much persistence. Six smells somewhat less phenolic than the Two or Four, but much more yeasty to me, plus maple syrup. I’m also getting a fair amount of apple skins with this beer, somewhat in the nose, but definitely in the flavor, which is probably the biggest difference between these so far. Take away the apple skins and Four and Six aren’t that different to me. Behind that, wheat and yeast up front with light toastiness in the finish. It’s also fairly sweet too. Body is medium-full and it’s quite well-carbonated. Would have been more enjoyable if the beer didn’t have what seems like a defect to me. Thing is, I would only want to retry this beer if I retried them all together again, and I just didn’t like any of the four beers enough to go through the effort of reacquiring them and tasting them all again.
This compares very similar to the Wheat 4 ale. It had a very large head and was amber in color. I did not like the flavor of this style of beer.
A quite smokey, chocolatey wheat ale - I taste many flavors I’ve never experienced in a wheat beer before - maple syrup, coffee, some earthy, wood notes - quite an interesting beverage indeed.
(Bottle) Pours a cloudy amber body with a huge long-lasting beige head. Aroma of mustiness, cloves, nuts, and caramel malt. Flavor of toasted malt, orange peel, and spicy yeast.
Batch 7119. Pour was amber in color. Good aroma and flavor. I liked it, but I’m not very familiar with the style.
i wasnt a huge fan of any of the wheat project beers, leaves a lot to be desired, out of them the love was by far the best
Batch 7119. Way over-carbonated. Maybe I just got an old 6-pack (even though this beer isn’t that old)...but the flavor wasn’t off or skunky. Hmmm, I’ve never run into quality concerns with Bell’s before.
At any rate, it tasted fine, so I think I can give an accurate review (assuming my sixer was an annomoly).
Hazy amber/copper color. Resinous and fruity aroma with strong wheat overtones. Spicy, herbal, and fruity...I love the melding of Belgian yeasts with a wheat beer like this. Mine was too effervescent, but I want to give Bell’s the benefit of the doubt and say other poeple might have better luck.
Pour is a dark reddish/copper brown with a large foamy head that goes down very slowly. Dark roasted wheat aroma - very rich aroma. Roasted wheat and carmel on the initial tast with lots and lots of carbonation. Nice thick mouthfeel. Pleasant sweetness in the taste without being cloying. One of the richer wheats I’ve tried. Excellent beer in the Bell’s wheat series.
Bottle. Hazy amber pour with a huge frothy light brown head that lasted with good lacing. Moderate toasted wheat aroma. Medium body with a sticky texture. Good complex toasted wheat and toffee flavor with a moderate bitter finish of long duration. Solid brew.