What Yeast To Keep In Your Yeast Library

[Thirsty Boy]

Godammit, the things you will do when you have to stay up all night...

So I want to build up a yeast library. I dont want every strain under the sun, just the smallest number that will allow me to brew a wide variety of beers. So I went through Jamil's book and worked out which yeasts he used and how often. I compiled myself a list. About ten strains will more or less brew me every style in the book....

I thought I would post my results up here for others to share - then I thought to myself, "hang on self, everyone on AB isn't the Jamil loving fanboy that you are... what about going through the AHB recipe database and doing the same thing??" So I did. All 10 pages of AG recipes in the DB and every yeast that is mentioned.

Thats 5 hours of my life I wont be getting back, but at least there is an excel spreadsheet to prove that I wasn'treally wasting my time... or at least thats what I'm tellng myself.

Anyway it boils down to this -

There are about 4 times as many entries that use one of WLP001, Wyeast 1056 or US05 than there are of anything else, the only thing that comes close is Nottingham. Between them they are probably 30% of the book and the DB.

At any rate, I have documented it all. The strains, how often they appear, and what styles they were used to brew. For the yeasts that appear in Brewing C;assic Styles, I have also included their attenuation range, flavour profile and alcohol tolerence.

This might give you a good idea of the strains you need to keep in your fridge so that you will be able to brew nearly every recipe in the Database, from that you can narrow it down to the styles you think you actually want to brew.

Hope its useful, otherwise my whole damn night was just a silly waste of time (bugger it)

Thirsty

View attachment Yeast_occurence.xls

 

[randyrob]

Hey TB,

nice work and interesting little spreadsheet.

Rob.

 

[eric8]

Thirsty,

Thats a whole lot of work right there, and a great idea. Thats definitely something to keep in the records.

 

[phonos]

you have serious problems thirsty - that was 5 hours of brewing time wasted right there!

Thanks for all you work, I've just started on a yeast library, and this is invaluable knowledge!

 

[warra48]

Nice work.
Downloaded and saved.
Thank you.

 

[Stuster]

Wow. Amazing, TB. Not really sure if it's worth 5 hours of your life, and you definitely have issues, but good stuff all the same. :super:

 

[Thommo]

Out of interest Thirsty, which 10 yeasts did you decide on?

 

[Weizguy]

Thirsty,
...not wanting to disrespect the effort you put in, but you could get by with one or two strains if you wanna take the advice of some winning brewers (and the companies hawking their product).

That is, the Cry Havoc strain from Papazian which he uses to brew all his prize-winning beers, and the Denny Conn strain (not the Wyeast link as it's not up yet) (IIRC) which has the same utility function.

Worth a thought? (or at least a couple of lines in a thread)
Les out

 

[Sammus]

So do you have the spreadsheet from Jamils book? (are you talking about BCS by JZ and JP?)

 

[Thirsty Boy]

So do you have the spreadsheet from Jamils book? (are you talking about BCS by JZ and JP?)

In the spreadsheet - the 25 yeast at the top headed with Yeast by BCS frequency and type - those are the yeasts from brewing classic styles

Les Wrote -

Thirsty,http://www.aussiehomebrewer.com/forum/style_images/hops/folder_editor_images/rte-email-button.png

...not wanting to disrespect the effort you put in, but you could get by with one or two strains if you wanna take the advice of some winning brewers (and the companies hawking their product).

That is, the Cry Havoc strain from Papazian which he uses to brew all his prize-winning beers, and the Denny Conn strain (not the Wyeast link as it's not up yet) (IIRC) which has the same utility function.

Disrespecting the amount of effort I put in is the only sensible response - It was a foolish amount. I do however have the self absorbed satisfaction of the martyr though. After all, working out the Brewing Classic Styles Yeasts only took 30-45mins, it was teh AHB stuff that took a long time, and I basically did that for the benefit of the wider AHB audience rather than myself. (Thirsty relaxes into smug self congratulation mode....)

I have chosen my preferred "winning brewers" and its JZ & JP winning out over CP & DC - besides, I think the whole "this is the only yeast I use" thing is BS. Are they brewing their weizens with those yeasts? are they brewing their Witbiers with the same yeast they are brewing their Munich Helles with? And if they are - how good are the beers. Papazian is famous for writing books and setting up the AHA, not for winning brewing competitions. Deny Conn is famous for being a batch sparge advocate and for a Rye IPA ... Jamil is famous for his recipe development skills and for being one of the most consistently successful homebrewers in the US - and I like him better.

Worth the couple of lines - but I'm far from convinced by the marketing speak in this case.

Mind you, I'd rather have less strains, the fewer the better - I think I will be able to get it down to half a dozen eventually. But i cant see it being many less than that.

Thommo wrote:

Out of interest Thirsty, which 10 yeasts did you decide on?

For me its ended up like this: I figure I need -

A Distinctly Malty Lager - 2206 Bavarian Lager
A Crisper drier lager - 2124 Bohemian Lager
A Low attenuating English Ale - 1968 London ESB
A Higher attenuating English Ale - 1028 London Ale
A Clean American Ale - 1056 American Ale
A Belgian Ale - 3787 Trappist High grav
A Kolsch/Alt Strain - 2565 Kolsch or maybe 2575 Kolsch II if I like the one I am brewing now
A Saison Strain - Probably the 3724 but I will try a few before I settle
A Wit Strain - 3944 Belgian Witbier
A Weizen Strain - 3068 Weheinstephan

And thats 10 - I will probably keep a few more in long term storage (frozen in glycerol) but those are the ones I will keep ready to use on slants. It will probably flex over time and if I can I will pair it down to less. But this will let me brew a pretty good and pretty authentic example of almost every style.

Hopefully the breakdown of frequency might help a few others who are trying to come up with their list too.

Thirsty

 

[braufrau]

Love it!

Its four o'clock in the morning so I might ponder the spreadsheet later this morning ... and book in to see a psychologist!

 

[arogers]

right now, for me there is the following yeasts recurring in my brewing:

White Labs WLP001 Californian Ale
White Labs WLP800 Pilsener
Safale S-04 English Ale

They cover most of my bases, however the S04 is slowly being ecclipsed by the White Labs Burton Ale.

 

[kirem]

That is, the Cry Havoc strain from Papazian which he uses to brew all his prize-winning beers, and the Denny Conn strain (not the Wyeast link as it's not up yet) (IIRC) which has the same utility function.

I have some wyeast packs of the Denny Conn yeast strain ordered. I can't find the Cry Havoc strain available for sale in Australia.

Has anyone seen this strain for sale in Aust?

 

[braufrau]

So i went back to bed and had the number 1056 running through my head and I started thinking .. of course 1056 is the most common yeast used in BCS because those are how americans see the world of beer. In an english version of classic styles there'd probably be a larger proportion of english yeasts because the english would see more differences in their beers than someone viewing from afar.

And then I started wondering what the book would look like if Jamil was australian and it followed the AABC styles, then it would include Aust. pale ale, dark ale, and australian/FES. Assuming, being a patriotic aussie, he made his FES with coopers yeast. Coopers should appear 3 times in the list.

So then I checked TBs spreadsheet and, sure enough, there is coopers in fourth place, if you lump all the 1056 variants togethor.

But I was sad to see that bjcp, not aabc styles are used on AHB.

I was also interested to see that S-189 comes in 7th which presumably means its used because its the most friendly lager yeast, so the AHB part of the spreadsheet is really interesting because it reflects australian beer styles, the styles we like to make the most, and yeasts that suit our local conditions best, whereas BCS gives equal weight to the most obscure styles as to APA.

But it would be nice to have a field on the DB for prizes received and then we could make a local, free, version of BCS. I know that's been suggested before.

So thanks TB .. that really was food for thought! Now if you'd like to make a matrix of hops vs. recipe so we can quickly see what to do with a bunch of left overs that would be great!

 

[The King of Spain]

Thanks Thirsty

I have just started using liquid yeasts (first one yesterday) now that Ross is stocking them. Usefull stuff.

KOS

 

[Fourstar]

Thirsty, that was me last week!



Just got my hands on some vials from proscitech and was thinking what ale strains to keep on hand

My ale list was very similar to yours. As i am a lager virgin im presuming the Lagers you have above would be good choices also.

I merely grabbed sime Wyeast strains im familiar with and listed them with their appropriate styles. (with the only lager bieng the cali common)

my options turned out to be:>

1099 - Whitbread Ale
1028 - London Ale
1056 - American Ale
3942 - Belgian Wheat
3068 - Weihenstephan Weizen
2112 - California Lager

Still got space for lagers, some high grav belgians, saison and kolsch.

 

[denimglen]

Thirsty, hope you don't mind me having a play with your chart.

I started something similar a while back with BCS but never got around to finishing it.

I thought I'd go through and add the data that appears in BYO's 150 Clones issue. I've added a totals column and resorted it by that. I've also added in the WhiteLabs numbers for the strains.

I may also go through the homebrewtalk.com's recipe database and add that too if I can find time. Although all the recipes there (and most other websites) aren't always tried and true. I've got a few other books here that could look through and add too if I can find some spare minutes in the day.

Braufrau, I agree with you, the data is slightly flawed because of how common it is to brew APA's, IPA's and other light ales that call for a neutral yeast. At least the chart will give us a good idea of what yeasts are worth keeping on hand for the styles we brew.

View attachment Yeast_occurence02.xls

 

[Thirsty Boy]

Thirsty, hope you don't mind me having a play with your chart.

I started something similar a while back with BCS but never got around to finishing it.

I thought I'd go through and add the data that appears in BYO's 150 Clones issue. I've added a totals column and resorted it by that. I've also added in the WhiteLabs numbers for the strains.

I may also go through the homebrewtalk.com's recipe database and add that too if I can find time. Although all the recipes there (and most other websites) aren't always tried and true. I've got a few other books here that could look through and add too if I can find some spare minutes in the day.

Braufrau, I agree with you, the data is slightly flawed because of how common it is to brew APA's, IPA's and other light ales that call for a neutral yeast. At least the chart will give us a good idea of what yeasts are worth keeping on hand for the styles we brew.

I dont mind at all - nice additions.

Not sure I agree with saying that the data is flawed though - at the end of the day the whole purpose is to give you a bit of an idea what yeast you might want to keep around, and well..... it seems obvious that number 1 on most peoples list would have to be a Chico strain of some sort.

Actually, thats one of the main reasons I decided to include the AHB database - so that we could get an idea of what yeasts are being used by real homebrewers in as Australian context . And the chico strains still dominate as a group. But the Notts is up there to prove you have a choice of you want it.

Where you say the sheet might be useful to know what yeasts to keep on hand for the styles YOU brew... thats why I decided to include the styles brewed with each yeast. Doesn't matter how "popular" it is, if you dont brew any of the styles it can make.. time to move to the next entry on the list.

Anyway, glad some people are finding it useful, I can only imagine that your additions will make it even more so.

Cheers

Thirsty

 

[matti]

These five would cover 99 % of my brews

2001 Urquell /WLP800 Czech Pilsner
2124 Bohemian Lager Yeast/ WLP830 German Lager Yeast/ W34/70
1187 Ringwood Ale Yeast/ WLP005 British Ale Yeast
1968 London ESB Ale Yeast/ WLP002 English Ale Yeast
1056 American Ale Yeast/ WLP001 California Ale Yeast/ S-05

Chuck in a Bock yeast, but with the toasty finnish the 2124 will do most the time
Whitbread dry has a place too occasionally.

 

[Thirsty Boy]

I pretty close to your way of thinking there matti,

But you only have to chuck in a belgian, a kolsch and a wheat ... and suddenly its heading back up to 10 strains again.

Still, I reckon your right, 5ish strains will end up doing 95% of the work