Want to culture a yeast to have on hand - What do you like to have on hand?

Since I have my fermenters busy at work and don't need to brew more beer right now, but I need to do something to scratch my itch to grow yeast (ok.. another way to say I Gotta brew something even if its just a starter). I'm looking to culture some commercially available yeast to have on hand and was looking for some suggestions of favorite yeasts to keep on hand for inspiring future brews. What commercially available strains do you like to culture and have available?

Well, my favorite yeasts to use are S-04 and US-05 since they're so reliable, but they're also cheap enough to not warrant culturing.

If I was going to choose some of my favorite liquid yeasts, it would have to be...

1. Wyeast Belgian Ardennes
2. Wyeast Irish Ale
3. Wyeast American Ale
4. Wyeast English Ale

I'd like to keep a wheat yeast on hand, but I'm always doing different style of wheat, so I'm not going to bother.

I've been using multiple washings of Wyeast European Ale since January. It's a clean yeast and ferments up to 10%. I've made enough batches with it that I'll probably buy a fresh strain once I run out of the jars of slurry I have in my fridge. So far I've used it to make: a harp clone, porter, cider, red ale, graff, two brown ales, and two blondes. All delicious.

What about commercially available strains from commercial bottle conditioned beer.

I love to keep PacMan, WLP001 and WLP002.

I keep pacman, Wyeast American 1056, and SN kellerweis. Since it is The summer I also have a wit strain.

Hopefully soon I'll add ringwood and maybe kolsch.

I always have these cultured strains available


1. bottle cultured pacman
2. bottle cultured bells
3. bottle cultured chimay
4. bottle cultured hoegaarden
5. WLP029

There aren't many beer styles I can't brew properly with these strains. This all being said, if I could only choose one culture....pacman is the real deal.

WLP037 (Samuel Smith's Strain, good for malty darker beers)
WLP023 (Henley of Thames, Awesome for bitters)
WLP051 (Anchor Liberty Strain, American style beers, when I make them)