E-Mail from Wyeast about 3787

Started a new thread, because the old one kinda dropped off, and this is probably useful for a lot of us here on the forums...

I e-mailed Wyeast asking about the High Gravity Trappist 3787 strain - here is the original e-mail:

Greetings!

There has been some discussion on the Homebrewtalk.com forums regarding
the 3787 yeast - you mention in your website that the 3787 "This type
of
yeast benefits from incremental feeding of sugars during fermentation,
making suitable conditions for doubles and triples, to ferment to
dryness."

What sort of differences can be expected in adding the sugar during
fermentation as opposed to adding it during the boil? Why does the
yeast
create a drier beer this way, and how would it affect the flavor
profile?

Thanks so much



And... here is Wyeast's very interesting reply...



Thank you for the email.

Excellent questions. 3787 can sometimes struggle to attenuate high
gravity wort. It will commonly form a dense cap in big beers which can
minimize the number of cells in suspension doing the actual work. In
addition, it is highly flocculent and can drop out of suspension
towards
the tail end of fermentation leaving some residual sugar. Gentle
agitation of the carboy can help with attenuation. This being said,
3787 has wonderful and unique character which makes it my favorite
Belgian strain.

Dosing the carboy with sugar during the course of fermentation will
keep
the sugar levels lower which can minimize the cap formation and
increase
the likelihood of complete attenuation. This will also change the
profile of the beer by lowering ester formation.

Please remember that all strains perform slightly differently in each
brew house. I suggest to continue experimenting with the strain to
find
what works in your brewery.

I hope that this helps.

Cheers,

Greg


Greg Doss
Quality Control Manager
Microbiologist/ Brewer
Wyeast Laboratories, Inc.

Interesting. I've used the sugar trick to help a saison finish up, but never had to with this yeast.

I'll have to try that the next time I do a Belgian. That is my favorite Belgian strain.

The cap formation, would this be the krausen? I brewed up a tripel on Monday night with this yeast strain. Tuesday night I found the krausen was like maybe 1/2 inch thick. Last night I found it at about 3 inches thick. I am using a 6 gal better bottle and am currently at a little over 3 gallons with original gravity of 1.064. I was going to feed it again and bump it up to 4 gallons, but with the krausen the way it is, I'll run out of room!

I was planning on grabbing a gravity sample tonight and if it is below 1.030, I would feed it again. Or should I wait until later?

I wonder if making a big starter makes a difference. My last tripel went from 1.089 to 1.015 with this yeast and no feedings.

bikegeek said:

I wonder if making a big starter makes a difference. My last tripel went from 1.089 to 1.015 with this yeast and no feedings.

Click to expand...

Based on your batch, feeding wouldn't have been necessary, heck you got over 80% attenuation...

I am trying the feeding method based on researching here. Did your krausen get very large?

I haven't used the 3787 before, but I got excellent attenuation with the 1762 on my tripel, and no dosings during fermentation. The only time I've used dosings is with the wlp099, trying to get to 15% for the Mephistopheles. I can't see bothering with dosings on anything below 1.100 OG, really.

I did a Bier de Garde and a Triple over the summer with 3787. I used the Bier de Garde as a starter for the Triple. Both of them had tremendous blow offs but came out excellent. I didn't feed them any sugar but I did pitch a lot of yeast (I did a starter for the Bier de Garde). Next time I use it, I'll use some Fermcap on it so I'm not cleaning yeast up off the floor. I ended up with 84 and 86% attenuation respectively. Awesome yeast.

Evan! said:

I can't see bothering with dosings on anything below 1.100 OG, really.

Click to expand...

That's probably a really good point that I didn't think of. I mean, I'm not trying to get 15%. But dumb me, figured I try the feeding route. Oh well.

jdoiv said:

Both of them had tremendous blow offs but came out excellent. I ended up with 84 and 86% attenuation respectively. Awesome yeast.

Click to expand...

Yeah I know. Good thing I'm only at 3 gal in the better bottle. I have so much foaming on top its crazy. >80% attenuation is awesome. I hope I get around the same!

If you guys were going the feeding route, would dosing below 1.03 be okay? Or do you guys think I need to wait until its lower? Or don't even bother and just feed it when I get home?

i have my first batch with 3787 in primary now - been there over two weeks - and WOW what a blow-off... i was actually getting a bit concerned by all the yeast that was blowing out...

the stuff i kept cleaning off the floor sure did smell nice, though!


i did not use the feeding method for this batch, as the OG was only about 1.070... i plan on washing the yeast and saving it, and the next batch I do, i'll try the feeding method and see how it works out.

Mulcahey's - as long as you are still in active fermentation, i imagine adding more fermentables would be fine. Keep us updated!

Mulcahey's Brewing said:

Did your krausen get very large?

Click to expand...

About 4.5" in a 6.5 gallon carboy.

Do you just add the sugar to the carboy? Do you dilute with boiled water?

I am going to batch up a small one gallon wort and add it in.

rbridges01 said:

Do you just add the sugar to the carboy? Do you dilute with boiled water?

Click to expand...

any time you want to add something to your beer, you'll want to boil it to sanitize it. So yeah, I'd boil the sugar in some water and cool it before adding it.

Didn't get to add it in last night. Got out of work late and then wwhen I got home and started to setup, I realized I was out of sanitizer. crap!!! Tonight, after I get some sanitizer at lunch break!

bikegeek said:

I wonder if making a big starter makes a difference. My last tripel went from 1.089 to 1.015 with this yeast and no feedings.

Click to expand...

1.015 is not that dry, and above BJCP style guidelines for a tripel; FG: 1.008 – 1.014. I am not a style freak, all I'm saying is that it may have been better, and more like a commercial tripel, if it had attenuated better and dried out a bit more. Its definitely a challenge though sometimes to get these beers down far enough.

I love that yeast, on my last trippel I got 86% Attenuation, with an OG of 1.098. It was the craziest fermentation I have ever had 4.5 gallons in a 7 gallon bucket and I had to take the lid off for 5-6 days cause it was like a volcano.

Just got 82.5% on my imperial stout with this yeast, love it!

Added sugar to my Belgian Dark Strong last night before bed. That really helped to kick start it...back to bubling quite nicely this morning.

When you guys feed your beer, do you always use sugar, or have any of you retained some of your wort in a sanitary vessel to use during the feedings?

I have a Belgian Dark Strong Ale, in the secondary. It is a Westy 12 clone. This is my first time with the 3787 yeast. I checked the bubble rate, last night, and it was about one bubble every 55 seconds.

It was 2 weeks in the primary, and has only been a week in the secondary. I think I'll just leave it alone for another couple weeks, before I start worrying about it. I'll pull a sample to check the gravity then.

I washed the yeast when I transfered to the secondary. Now I'm set for a few more big batches of Belgian Ale.

landhoney said:

1.015 is not that dry, and above BJCP style guidelines for a tripel; FG: 1.008 – 1.014. I am not a style freak, all I'm saying is that it may have been better, and more like a commercial tripel, if it had attenuated better and dried out a bit more. Its definitely a challenge though sometimes to get these beers down far enough.

Click to expand...

When I last brewed it, the 2008 style guide wasn't out yet. Previous guidelines were FG at 1.010-1.016. My OG was high at 1.089 with old and new guidelines at 1.075 - 1.085. Not that it matters at all, it tasted great!

I only originally posted because the feeding suggestion surprised me given my experiences with this yeast.

Ryanh1801 said:

It was the craziest fermentation I have ever had 4.5 gallons in a 7 gallon bucket and I had to take the lid off for 5-6 days cause it was like a volcano.

Click to expand...

I just found this out the hard way. Dosed in an other gallon of wort to the better bottle last night after work (6pm). I was at 3 gallons and probably 3-4 inches of krausen when I transferred. I transferred it in and the krausen died down. I put a new air lock on and set it back in the temperature bath. Basement is very cold these days. Checked it last night (1130 pm) and it blew the top off of the airlock and was spilling down in to the water bath. CRAP!!! Pulled the airlock and cap out and afixed a blow off tube that I submerged into the water bath, which I had previously added a few drops of bleach.

I didn't use corn sugar to feed. I made a one gallon wort with 2.lbs Extra Light DME, a pound of Light Candi Sugar and some willamette hops. I was going to do two feedings to get to five gallons, but I decided to feed it one stronger 1 gal wort and end with 4 gallons. Too much work and too much risk of contamination to keep opening it up like that. Plus, I'm out of space...

Old thread, but I think I may have just found out the hard way what the dense cap is that's referred to in the letter. I brewed at dark strong ale with an OG of 1105 last night. When I hit the sack at about 2 a.m., it was already bubbling in the top inch or so or wort. At noon today, the krausen is two inches thick, but the fermentation activity in the wort is limited to the top 2.75 inches. Below that is just still dark wort. Not sure what else I can do at this point but wait and see what happens.

Ok, now things are progressing normally. False alarm.

I used this yeast in my Chimay Blue clone, but I don't think I'm getting nearly the attenuation everyone here is talking about. I'm a newb - I didn't get a starting OG reading, but the recipe estimated it around 1.060. I also didn't make a starter, I just started the smack pack a few hours before hand and pitched it(I know better now). After 1 week, I'd only got it down to around 1.040 and it was still very sweet and yeast-laden..... That was Saturday. I'll check it again this weekend, but does it sound like I need to pitch more yeast, more sugar, or just let it chew on the wort another week or 2 before I get paranoid? Per the calculator I used, that had the ABV only at 2.5%, and it was still way too sweet for as slow as the bubble was going (20-30 secs between). Any opinions?

Raise the temp of the primary.

What's the best way to go about that? Maybe bring it up from the basement in the sunny living room, yet keep it covered from direct light? And how warm would you raise it to?

adagiogray said:

What's the best way to go about that? Maybe bring it up from the basement in the sunny living room, yet keep it covered from direct light? And how warm would you raise it to?

Click to expand...

I recently used this yeast and to get it to finish out where I wanted it, I raised the time to 80+ degrees F and added an invert sugar syrup. I used a heating pad that is for sore muscles and a towel and sweatshirt over the top to insulate it.

I started at about 1.083ish (with the sugar taken into account) and finished at 1.001. I mashed my grain at about 145- 147.