Go drink a Hefeweizen and tell me what you think. I recommend something by Ayinger. Though chances are most American supermarkets will just have Franziskaner, which is perfectly fine if you can't find Ayinger (note: avoid American examples, even if they call themselves "Hefeweizen". American wheat beers are a totally different style and lack the banana and clove notes of German Hefeweizen).
It's not subtle. At all. Hefeweizen contains large amounts of both banana esters and clove phenols, and drinking one is like drinking spicy banana bread. The first time I had one, it was so different from everything I had before that that it was outright jarring (this was shortly after I turned 21, before I knew much about beer).
Hofbrau is imho the best Hefe that is easily available in the states.
My story is I spent about a year trying to get into wine... admitedly for the slightly shallow goal of impressing women, and then I spent a summer in Germany with some family and came back a beer aficionado, and haven't looked back since. The American craft scene has exploded since then and it's easy to find phenomenal beers here. (though good german/belgium imports are still my goto)
I have, however, been learning how to cook (I can not thank blue apron enough), and have been really enjoying using wine in my cooking. The main wines I still drink are port, madeira, pino, and icewine.
My personal favorite is Paulaner. Erdinger is also good, but in general any German hefeweizen way surpasses any American wheat. The closest I've found is Widmer. And as far as I know there are no US examples of Dunkel Weizen, the dark German wheat beer.
I dislike hefewizen in general, I'm just a dark beer kind of guy, but OH MY GOD Erdinger Dunkel Weizen is amazing, and it's become fairly easy to find in the US.
This, except I first tried a hefe and noticed the banana bread flavor in Public House Brewery's Hefeweizen, which is a US brewery. Its a flavor present in every hefe I've drank and brewed myself, but I won't argue the fact German Hefe's are a whole nother level of flavor.
The reason why I mentioned avoiding US breweries was because of the American Wheat Beer style [0], which is very different from an actual Hefe, and unfortunately some AWBs use "Hefeweizen" in the brand name (e.g. Widmer, and I think Pyramid too).
Of course there are some US breweries who brew to the German style, and I'll take your word for it that Public House Brewery does, but my suggestion of avoiding US breweries was aimed at someone who isn't familiar with beer at all and probably wouldn't take nearly as well to "pull out your phone and Google every example you see in the supermarket to make sure it's a proper Hefe and not an AWB" as they would to "look at the label and see if the brewery is German".
It's not subtle. At all. Hefeweizen contains large amounts of both banana esters and clove phenols, and drinking one is like drinking spicy banana bread. The first time I had one, it was so different from everything I had before that that it was outright jarring (this was shortly after I turned 21, before I knew much about beer).