Blending Dried Yeasts

[mfdes]

A quich question, for something I've never done before.
Many commercial breweries use yeast blends for their primary fermentation... presumably these are kept as separate strains and blended prior to pitching to keep the balance right, then re-used only a few times if at all.

I am ready to brew an English special bitter with emphasis on the hops, a blend of EKG and fuggle. It will be dry hopped. I have a narrow window of opportunity to put a brew in this weekend and I don't have enough of any appropriate liquid yeast culture to use. Next few weekends are out already.

Living in Hobart there is a limited range of dried yeasts I could use, namely US-56 and S-04, both of which I have at home.

I've never used either before, but by reputation US-56 is clean, low diacetyl and ferments fairly dry, whereas S-04 is fruity (a bit too much for some), an early flocculator and produces noticeable diacetyl.

Any thoughts on using a blend of the two? I can't see why 1 packet of each, or 1.5 of US-56 and 1/2 a packet of S-04 would not give me an intermediate beer... My reasoning is that the proportion of S-04 in the blend will lend some character, but the US-56 will remain suspended to finish the job once S-04 quits... any thoughts would be much appreciated.

P.S.: Last night's H.O.P.S. meeting was pretty good hey?

MFS.

 

[Tony]

I have not done this either but i have put some thought towards the concept.

I would asume a blend of any yeast will still firment out as dry as the most attenuative yeast in the blend will firment to. Once the SO-4 finnishes at say 74% attenuation, the US-56 will keep plugging on till it reaches its 80 odd percent.

But you will gain some character from the SO-4.

I have used both these yeasts a fair bit...... the SO-4 much more so and i would recoment you just use this. Mash a tad cooler... say 65 deg and the residual sweetness left by the yeast will ballance the bitterness (it aint called a bitter for nothing) Firment it at 18 to 19 deg for a cleaner finnish. people who bag this strain probably let it run at 24 deg and it will be a bit much up there.

I did just this with an ESB/IPA type beer i have in secondary ATM and its clean. I got 74 % attenuation and the sweetness and bitterness work very well together.

If you use the US-56 yeast you may need to reduce your bitterness to ballance the beer as i dont think english bitters are ment to be that dry.

I think ross uses a blend of windsor and US-56..... Ross ?

cheers

 

[Sammus]

I recently put down a SFPA (recipe section) but the only yeast I could get my hands on was brew cellar english ale yeast (T58 I think) - It got it from 1.060 down to 1.025 ish then stuck at about 8-10C due to cold weather. I picked up a heater belt and brought it up to 16-17, but I think the yeast wasn't in great nick after that, because there was no more bubbling. I dropped in a pack of US-05 (ie US-56) and it started bubbling away again (albeit slowly) after about 24hrs. Dunno if its finished yet I wont be home for a couple days - should be interesting though. I might try keeping some of the slurry, dunno if itll be blendy, more likely a bunch of dead t58 and a tiny bit of us-05...

 

[kook]

I've got a stout going at the moment with a blend of Nottingham & Windsor. I'll report back once I give it a taste on the weekend.

 

[Steve]

Out of the two, if like you say you want emphasis on the hops I would go the US56. Or if you want to have a play I reckon throw in half a packet of each just for experiments sake. I personally havent done this and have never detected diacetyle from either. My only experience with blending yeasts is in my first ever mongrel keg. It has S189, T58, Nottingham Ale

http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/inde...&hl=mongrel

Its bloody beautiful.
Cheers
Steve

 

[matti]

Has any one tried blending a saflager yeast with an ale yeast?
Any thoughts?

 

[0M39A]

not too sure about your question, but the hops meeting was amazing

shame i didnt realise who you were. dunno if you would have remembered me, but i was wearing a black jacket, have a goatee and asked a few questions about the grayston's and the wizard smith.

seems like you already know what the yeast characteristics are like. I brew mostly APA's, and stick with US-05, but i have done a few english bitters before using s-04 and (IMO) they've turned out great.

 

[weizenhiemer]

Has any one tried blending a saflager yeast with an ale yeast?
Any thoughts?

Only One. Why?

 

[matti]

A buddy asked me and I wasn't sure if it was a great idea.
i think it was about fermenting at different temperatures since he couldn't yet control it yet.
My response were that you can never be able to replicate it unless you chart every aspect of the ferment.
Not likely to try it myself though.

 

[KoNG]

i've done a 50/50 blend of S04 and nottingham....
beer came out quite well, cant see any huge issues with it.

go for it