TAILWAGGER WHEAT: SWEET & SPICED BUBBLY CHEER
Bavarian Hefeweizen
With a 4.9% ABV, our Tailwagger Wheat is a Bavarian Hefeweizen with scrumptious banana, clove and slight vanilla flavors.
A traditional unfiltered wheat ale with hazy straw coloring, it has a cheerful glow and enticing aromas of fruity banana and hints of spicy clove.
Its extremely low bitterness makes it the beer that dreams are made for lovers of non-hoppy brews — the graininess and breadiness from the wheat sensational in each sip.
Here’s why the Tailwagger Wheat, which is especially fun to drink in the fall because of the fruity and slightly spicy notes, is a rare gem of a beer.
It's All About the Yeast
A Hefeweizen has German roots, and the name itself means yeast (“hefe”) and wheat (“weizen”) — the two main ingredients that make it so drinkable and delicious.
A Hefeweizen is a type of Weissbier — a beer that’s made with primarily wheat. What makes Hefeweizen really stand out from other wheat beers is the flavors and aromas that it derives from the yeast used to brew it and that give it its trademark unique flavors.
One of the most prominent flavors and aromas in Hefeweizens is banana, making it a much loved favorite of many light beer lovers. The yeast it’s brewed with also gives it flavors and aromas of clove, vanilla, and many can taste hints of bubblegum and black pepper as well!
This bright straw colored beer sparkles with carbonation and is brimming with bubbles that rise up to greet you. Thanks to its higher wheat content, it’s topped off with a thick, fluffy, and foamy white head, making it an easy drinking and inviting brew.
One of the most versatile beers out there for pairing with food, its wheaty, bready, slightly sweet and spicy flavors and carbonated lightness make it a refreshing beer that’s perfect for pairing with all sorts of fun dishes.
When it comes to this beer the sky is your limit for food pairing, but some downright delectable dishes to pair it with include foods with citrus flavors, rich and sweet seafood (lobster or scallops anyone?), and, of course, Bavarian Weisswurst sausages!
Hefeweizen - Saved by the Dukes
Hefeweizen has proved time and again that it’s got grit (not literally) and stamina. One of the most popular beers in the world, it’s survived its share of hard times.
Since it originated in the 1520s in Bavaria, Germany, the odds were against it. Germany had proposed the Reinheitsgebot, or Purity Law, back in 1487, stating that the only ingredients allowed in beer were barely, hops, and water (yeast, the main ingredient of Heefeweizens, wasn’t even mentioned then).
The point of the law was to ensure that only affordable and basic ingredients were used that were easily accessible to everyone who wanted to brew and sell beer. It was also to get health standards up to par because up until then some brewers had been using questionable and unsafe methods for preserving their beer. On top of all of that, foreign beers were no longer allowed to be imported into Germany because they did not live up to the Purity Law’s standards.
Well, in 1516 Bavaria also adapted the Purity Law, lots of breweries started brewing their beers with the hop-barley-water mix, and tons of people were upset by their low quality and bad tasting beers.
Eventually, in an act of rebellion, some breweries started putting different flavor-improving additives in their beers, and one of those beers was the Weissbier — crafted from wheat and malted barley.
Because the royals got on board with these better tasting beers in the 1520s, a law was passed that allowed a single brewery in Bavaria to brew it that was managed and backed by some dukes called the Dukes of Degenberg.
Eventually the brewing of the high quality Weissbier boomed and breweries all over Bavaria were allowed to brew this wonder, making it an extremely popular style of beer in Bavaria that was still fully managed by the Dukes of Degenberg, but who eventually passed it to control of another party.
In the 1700s its popularity started to drastically dwindle because traditional dark lagers made a comeback and stole the spotlight in the beer world. After the Weissbier’s popularity and money-making abilities were no more, no one party was trying to hold onto the rights of it anymore and the law was amended in 1778 so that anyone could brew this style of beer.
Therefore, when 1812 came around only two Barvarian breweries were still making this still not-so-popular style of beer. In 1856 they sold their declining businesses to George Schneider I, and his family owned business became the most popular Weissbier brewery in the world once the popularity of the beer boomed again in the mid-1900s.
Beer lovers all over have, once again, fallen head-over-heels for this wonderful bubble-gum smelling brew.
Welcome Back to the Line Up
Tailwagger Hefeweizen’s banana-clove aroma has been pulling in fans of this style of brew for decades (seriously). Once upon a time, Tailwagger was canned and also available on draft. A few years ago, we made the decision to retire its can design and work on a new way to present this tasty brew. With the “Duck Hunter”-esque video-game inspired art in hand, Tailwagger made its return to our year-round signature cans line up this past summer. Ask for Big Dog’s Tailwagger Hefeweizen at your favorite craft beer retailers.
Get Your Drink On
Ready to dive deep down into a refreshing and festively fall-like glass of our Tailwagger Wheat?
You can find it on draft at our Big Dog’s Draft House on N. Rancho and at select accounts throughout the Silver State in 16 oz. cans around town, year round!
