The flavor power of yeast

I brewed on Sunday.

5.25 lbs us-2row
5.25 lbs red wheat
1 lb briess pils dme
2 oz hallertau hops 1 at 60 1 at 5

2l starter of washed 3787

Just took hydro reading and this tastes just like a wit. No spices. Nothing but spice flavor. First time the yeast dominated the character of the beer.

Yeast accounts for about 40% of the flavor profile, as most learned brewmasters will tell you. There is no question about the "flavor power" of yeast. I can cook up some wort, divide it into 5 separate fermenters, and simply pitch a different yeast into each one, and not only will I have 5 very different beers, but if I make smart selections, they could qualify as 5 distinctly different styles.

And on top of all that, you're using a Trappist/Belgian yeast. Of course the yeast is going to be responsible for some intense and unique flavors.

Pretty cool stuff, I agree, and I don't mean to be mean but I'm not sure stuff like this even warrants a post.

Just promise me that when you use brew up a simple hefe using hefe yeast, that you won't make a similar post about the taste of bananas in your beer - and you didn't even add any bananas!

Welcome to brewing, and the huge range of styles and yeasts that we're lucky to be enthusiasts at a time when they're so easily available.

emjay said:

Pretty cool stuff, I agree, and I don't mean to be mean but I'm not sure stuff like this even warrants a post.

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Your statement isn't mean, it's arrogant. How else does someone become a "learned brewmaster" without talking (or in this case posting) about their results whether they were expected or unexpected? Not only is reading an excellent learning tool but discussion is an excellent learning tool, too.

To the OP: What was your original/final SP? What made you choose that particular yeast?

Emjay - thanks for welcoming me. I would like to point out however that I brewed my first solo batch in 1996 and helped my dad brew for the first time in 1987. There aren't many places I can go to discuss my hobby, my wife really doesn' t care, nor does my four year old. I posted an observation that I had never before tasted pure yeast character like I do in this batch. That's it. Try not to be so condescending. You'll drive people away from the forum.

Stardust-1.053 og 1.010 as of this morning. I chose the yeast because it was my first attempt at washing and wanted to see if there were any flaws I had created in the yeast.

dawgman said:

Emjay - thanks for welcoming me. I would like to point out however that I brewed my first solo batch in 1996 and helped my dad brew for the first time in 1987. There aren't many places I can go to discuss my hobby, my wife really doesn' t care, nor does my four year old. I posted an observation that I had never before tasted pure yeast character like I do in this batch. That's it. Try not to be so condescending. You'll drive people away from the forum.

Stardust-1.053 og 1.010 as of this morning. I chose the yeast because it was my first attempt at washing and wanted to see if there were any flaws I had created in the yeast.

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You should of posted asking a question like using Idophor for starch conversion, he probably would of ignored that.

I love the different yeast tastes in beer and like yourself love finding new discoveries like this. Who knows, using a Hefe yeast in a brown might taste good, or using something like a Pacman yeast in an American Wheat might taste great. It's all about playing with things that most others wouldn't try.

I apologize, that was far from my intention. The fact that you said you had washed this particular yeast (and therefore had obviously used it before), made it seem that you should have encountered this before.

As for the learned brewmaster thing... not meant to be condescending at all as that was NOT meant to be inclusive of myself. I meant it in the exact same way that somebody would say, "John Palmer says 40% blah blah blah."

I'm sorry if I came off a bit abrasive (written posts don't exactly allow for intonation to let the reader pick up on what is sarcasm and what is not), and I tried to make it as clear as possible that the bananas comment was purely in jest, but I guess anything short of verbally fellating one another is frowned upon here.

SwampassJ said:

I love the different yeast tastes in beer and like yourself love finding new discoveries like this.

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Absolutely! Now I've half a mind to try this myself and start a different post... mostly to annoy someone who seems to be suffering from PMS. Take a midol and go to bed, hon. You'll feel better tomorrow. Maybe.

emjay said:

but I guess anything short of verbally fellating one another is frowned upon here.

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Correct. Now, where's that blowjob I ordered??

Stardust said:

Absolutely! Now I've half a mind to try this myself and start a different post... mostly to annoy someone who seems to be suffering from PMS. Take a midol and go to bed, hon. You'll feel better tomorrow. Maybe.

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I'm actually doing just fantastic right now - a thread like this with no actual bad intentions isn't going to bother me.

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black though, labeling my post as arrogant, and then vomiting THAT. Especially when the assessment seems to have been made by jumping on the assumption that I counted myself among the "learned brewmasters", when I was simply trying to provide the OP a bit of information gleaned from people far more knowledgeable and experienced than I. While I admit my post in general wasn't even trying to be helpful and informative, that paragraph was the one part where I made a genuine attempt at it.

The fact that so many people seem to think I was deriding the poster for not knowing something would definitely indicate that my online communication skills need a bit of work (though the really late night didn't help), because that's not even close to what I was trying to say. While I personally feel that people far too quickly jumped to conclusions, I also can't ignore the fact that I articulated it poorly enough for that to happen.

Overall I was somewhat confused about the point of the thread. It wasn't asking for help or information, nor did any sort of question even seem to be implied. It also wasn't really providing any information that could be of any real help or provide insight to other users. It was simply a very basic, inevitable observation that every homebrewer is going to make at some point (generally sooner rather than later) whether they like it or not. My only gripe was that if everybody felt such observations warranted their own threads, the forums would be flooded with posts with observations like this, or how wort tastes sweet, or how cool the bubbling of the airlock is, or how hops are bitter, etc, etc.

Nothing wrong with sharing these observations (and the flavor contributions of yeast is, to me, one of the most interesting facets of brewing), just that they are much better suited to a BLOG. If everybody thought all their little observations (without even a pertinent question or something) were worthy and deserving of their own threads, it'd reduce the forum to complete and utter frivolity as it'd drown out posts with real insights or information helpful to brewers new or experienced, as well as questions people may actually need answered.

That is, of course, just my opinion, but not an entirely baseless one. You don't have to agree with me, and in fact I welcome disagreement, especially if it can provide me with a point of view I may be overlooking - I don't feel the need to always be right, I'd much rather find out I'm wrong, if that's the case. But the mudslinging going on here is totally unwarranted, and actually nothing short of ironic when you consider what you're accusing me of.

bigbeergeek said:

Correct. Now, where's that blowjob I ordered??

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Held up at customs

emjay said:

I'm actually doing just fantastic right now - a thread like this with no actual bad intentions isn't going to bother me.

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black though, labeling my post as arrogant, and then vomiting THAT. Especially when the assessment seems to have been made by jumping on the assumption that I counted myself among the "learned brewmasters", when I was simply trying to provide the OP a bit of information gleaned from people far more knowledgeable and experienced than I. While I admit my post in general wasn't even trying to be helpful and informative, that paragraph was the one part where I made a genuine attempt at it.

The fact that so many people seem to think I was deriding the poster for not knowing something would definitely indicate that my online communication skills need a bit of work (though the really late night didn't help), because that's not even close to what I was trying to say. While I personally feel that people far too quickly jumped to conclusions, I also can't ignore the fact that I articulated it poorly enough for that to happen.

Overall I was somewhat confused about the point of the thread. It wasn't asking for help or information, nor did any sort of question even seem to be implied. It also wasn't really providing any information that could be of any real help or provide insight to other users. It was simply a very basic, inevitable observation that every homebrewer is going to make at some point (generally sooner rather than later) whether they like it or not. My only gripe was that if everybody felt such observations warranted their own threads, the forums would be flooded with posts with observations like this, or how wort tastes sweet, or how cool the bubbling of the airlock is, or how hops are bitter, etc, etc.

Nothing wrong with sharing these observations (and the flavor contributions of yeast is, to me, one of the most interesting facets of brewing), just that they are much better suited to a BLOG. If everybody thought all their little observations (without even a pertinent question or something) were worthy and deserving of their own threads, it'd reduce the forum to complete and utter frivolity as it'd drown out posts with real insights or information helpful to brewers new or experienced, as well as questions people may actually need answered.

That is, of course, just my opinion, but not an entirely baseless one. You don't have to agree with me, and in fact I welcome disagreement, especially if it can provide me with a point of view I may be overlooking - I don't feel the need to always be right, I'd much rather find out I'm wrong, if that's the case. But the mudslinging going on here is totally unwarranted, and actually nothing short of ironic when you consider what you're accusing me of.

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Had he posted his (IYNSHO) "little observation" in a blog we wouldn't have gotten the chance to deride him for sharing, or emasculate his attempt at offering value. <--Sarcasm.

Kind of pricky. <--IMO

IYNSHO == In your not so humble opinion

LakewoodBrew said:

Had he posted his (IYNSHO) "little observation" in a blog we wouldn't have gotten the chance to deride him for sharing, or emasculate his attempt at offering value. <--Sarcasm.

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"Sort of" (and by that I mean completely) misses the point. I have no interest in deriding, emasculating, belittling, or otherwise insulting anyone. I simply think a post of this nature would be better suited to a blog... and if that means "we" wouldn't have had the chance to do all those things, all the better. Putting the "little observation" part in quotes to suggest I'm somehow undermining his experiences is a joke... like I said, I find the whole thing fascinating myself, but what I meant was that, while it's amazing on a personal level, it's a pretty routine observation that anybody using a Belgian yeast will make, and to suggest otherwise is just silly.

People make a big deal all the time about forum clutter when posters fail to try the search engine first. This isn't all that different. There's no need to turn the HBT forums into LiveJournal.

I apologized for the abrasiveness of my post late last night, and you don't have to agree with me as to whether threads like this really ought to be here, but, just like I was wrong for being a smart-ass last night (and rightfully called out on it, even if under the wrong assumptions), these posts are equally wrong and unjustified. And frankly, the continued attempt to make it seem like I'm still trying to insult the OP (and at this point, I'm just treating it as an example of a larger issue) is not just petty and childish, but almost suggests a desire to insult him by proxy.

This is not a personal thing. I don't think the OP's observations and opinions are any less valuable than anyone else's - I simply believe that stuff like this, from ANYONE, is better suited to a medium like a blog. I believe this site even provides a function for it. And, given how amazing I find the use of different yeast strains (and even treating/stressing it in different ways) to achieve such dramatically flavor profiles, a fascination that dawgman seems to share, I'd actually likely be inclined to check his blog out if he had one.

Anyways, I think I've said enough on the topic and really don't need to keep going in circles only to be met with more mud-slinging. If you fail to see the point by now, you're either being willfully ignorant/combative, or willfulness is not even a luxury you have when it comes to ignorance. Either way, this has become absolutely pointless. The only person I owe an apology to is dawgman, and only for the manner and tone of my original reply - I still don't think this kind of thing ought to have an entire thread dedicated to it (and if those of you vehemently trash-talking actually believed it did, you wouldn't be so wholly contributing to the derailment of it), but there's nothing really wrong with what he did, and he didn't deserve that initial attitude.

Regardless of this obvious difference in opinion dawgman, I hope you know I'm sincere in my apology. And you're absolutely right that the environment created by things like such a response to an innocent thread is not conducive to a growing, friendly community.

With that being said... time to pop a Midol and head off to bed. I can guarantee this thread will be the last thing on my mind, but it seems as if it will take quite a while for some people here to clean out all that sand from that most irritating of all places.

This thread is out of hand. Everyone, just put your keyboards down and walk away.

Sent from my Droid using Home Brew Talk

Damn... Speaking of Not warranting a dissertation of a post.

I have used the same yeast for all my beers except one. Nottingham dry, there is usually an apple undertone to the beers, which is cool since I prefer summer brews. one batch I changed things up and used US so4 the bannanna aroma was unbeliveable. I'm still learning all the basics to tweaking. so far I have only used 2 recipes, everything else I have made out of my head (and tips from some local highly expirienced brewers). I'm sticking with the same yeast for everything right now because I want to get more of a handle on my basic ingredients before I throw another variable in. at some point I will probably brew a large batch and split it, use two different yeasts, just so I can see exactly how much the difference will be. which should be cool. the flavor power of yeast is pretty cool I agree.

Edit: on a side note after reading all the byplay, I don't understand blogging and how it is any different from a forum except a blog is a private to public medium and a forum is a public to public medium. after that I'm lost. I don't see a problem with the op stating his surprise about the flavor on a forum. but I also don't really see the problem with a poster noting how he might not have been surprised if he had researched more. its not like anyone said "hey your dumb for not knowing". IMO (I don't know about humble) nothing was said hatefully, a bit sarcastically sure, but I didn't see any vehemence, until everyone started jumping on the responder. ah well, authors spend their entire lives trying to convey true meaning to their readers, and most fail, how is an average poster supposed to come close? verbal fellatio? I think was mentioned ;')

Best beer I bave brewed to date.

No hard feelings. I still have not bottled tbe beer I first brewed with this yeast. It is kicking it with a few wine soaked oak cubes til august.

dawgman said:

Best beer I bave brewed to date.

No hard feelings. I still have not bottled tbe beer I first brewed with this yeast. It is kicking it with a few wine soaked oak cubes til august.

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thats great. I love when My next brew is a triumph over the last one. though the once in a while "really!?! I brewed this horsepiss?" keeps me humble on the level of my brewing expertise which still remains between noob and sort of noobish.

ReefkprZ said:

thats great. I love when My next brew is a triumph over the last one. though the once in a while "really!?! I brewed this horsepiss?" keeps me humble on the level of my brewing expertise which still remains between noob and sort of noobish.

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Pissing myself at this one! I spent a few weeks in Belguim last Winter and felt that the profile of many of their beers was a bit 1 dimensional(it did take me 2 weeks of drinking to decide this so maybe i was just getting a bit beered off). Other words it was mostly yeast coming through in the beers i was drinking so yes i agree with OP. Now what was the question?