Yeast Test Split Batch

In order to get a better understanding of what exact flavors several yeasts produce, I was thinking of splitting a batch into 5 x 1 gallon jugs for fermentation, each with a different yeast. Depending on the results, I am thinking about running this experiment several times to get a feel for a bunch of different yeasts (would really like to understand most of what White Labs and Wyeast are selling).

Because I want to be sure I'm comparing fairly, I'm looking for what I should use as my base wort. My first inclination is to just use some amber LME and, say, 1 oz of East Kent Goldings for bittering.

Given the variety of those yeasts, is that a reasonable base wort to try? Should I go with something lighter? A more neutral hop? A completely different approach because I'm on crack?

If you use one liquid yeast in 1 gal, you'll be over-pitching by a factor of 2-3, so you probably won't get the same flavor profile when you scale those yeasts up to a full batch. Other than that, I think it's a solid plan.

Good call. I'll make sure to only pitch about half of each package of yeast. I may end up wasting some yeast in this process, but this is an experiment, not production, so that's part of the cost of learning.

Of course, I could just save the remaining half of the yeast and build up starters for each so I can use them in real batches too.

So, I picked up my first 5 yeasts to test out today. Here's what I grabbed from the fridge at LHBS (which is actually Midwest Supplies on Sundays when the closer one is closed).

WLP550 Belgian Ale Yeast
WLP500 Trappist Ale Yeast
WLP002 English Ale Yeast
WLP004 Irish Ale Yeast
WLP028 Edinburgh Scottish Ale Yeast

I'm very interested in your findings.

Subscribed.
Interesting, Last night I brewed a 10 gallon batch of my house Amber and split it. 5 gallons got Wyeast American ale, and 5 galons got Wyeast British Ale. I Cant wait to further develop my taste buds.

I've been planning a very similar experiment. The LHBS doesn't have as wide a selection as any of the online retailers, but I can reliably get Wheat DME, domestic hops, and Fermentis yeast, and I don't have to be particularly concerned with shelf life. I was planning on a simple 4 gallon wort along the lines of:

4 lbs Wheat DME (55% wheat/45% barley)
Cascade hop plugs, 15-20 IBUs and little to no aroma/flavor
2 grams per jug rehydrated US-05, S-33, T-58, or WB-06.

Ferment at 70 degrees for two weeks and bottle.

Since I'm trying to get a good idea of the differences between the flavors, I'm pitching on the low side and fermenting on the high side of the recommended range. The US-05 is in there as a control group to see what a clean tasting strain does under conditions meant to maximize esters. I love American style wheat beers, but the goal is to help me choose a suitable dry yeast for something more german or belgian and have a cheap and easy house wheat beer. I may try to make starters for the leftover yeast and run the experiment at different temps, from 60 to 75. I've already had surprisingly, almost overbearingly estery results from T-58 on an unintentionally high gravity wit that is still in secondary, and I think I might be able to get a good wheat beer from dry yeast if I just give it the right fermentation conditions.

OK. I finally got around to doing this today. I used the yeasts I listed before and the following as my wort:

1lb light DME
6.6lbs Amber LME (Midwest Supplies LME)
1 oz East Kent Goldings for 60 min

I then put a little less than a gallon into each gallon jug and pitched the yeast. Each is labelled with the necessary information and now we wait.


5 yeast comparison experiment by J Wynia, on Flickr

Oh, and I did pitch entire vials of yeast. Given that I make starters whenever I can, the overpitching of yeast isn't terribly out of line.

subscribed. Interested to see how this turns out. Do you have ones picked out for the next round?

I'm waiting until the tasting session of these results before deciding what to do next in this vein of yeast testing. That's due in large part to wanting to see how big of a difference the yeast makes in these results. If I can't taste much difference (not that I think that's likely), I need to refine my palette before going forward much.

Otherwise, the next batch of yeast testing that I want to do is with cider. Given the limited number of cider-specific yeasts out there, I want to try a wider variety of wine/beer/mead yeasts in my ciders to settle on a few to work with.

My plan is to have my homebrew club do the tasting blind in the next month or 2 along with me. I want to see how well we as a group can tell them apart.

I also want to do the "amber ale" wort with some dry yeasts for comparison too.

I like those big labels!

Subscribed. Also, you are essentially making starters of each of these. I would harvest all the yeasts and direct pitch into normal batches.

I bought a Brother labelmaker and use the "name badge" labels for labeling nearly everything in my brewery. Lets me put lots of info on the label and in big text.

While these are sort of starters, most starters aren't hopped and this has a starting gravity of 1.056 instead of the more typical 1.030 starters have.

I will probably harvest the yeasts, but it depends on the brewing calendar and my schedule whether that happens or not. My available time to dedicate to brewing activities is my dominant bottleneck in my brewery. To direct pitch these yeasts into normal batches, I have to have time to make those normal batches.

Bottled the results of this test yesterday. I tasted some of each as I bottled. Obviously, they weren't carbonated, but it was still very interesting tasting the comparison during the bottling.

So, with the 5 yeasts involved, they fell into 3 groups by taste:

Irish/Scottish
English
Belgian

There is a really big difference between the groups. I'm going to have my homebrew club taste them blind, but I'll be 100% shocked if they can't group them this way.

The difference between Irish and Scottish is much more subtle, but clearly there. The same is true between the Belgian Ale and Trappist Ale yeasts.

I really should have pulled my samples into separate glasses, so I could try them side by side, but that's what the carbonated test will be for.

Even from this preliminary tasting, I have to say that if you've ever been curious about exactly what the differences are between yeast strains are and how much it matters, you MUST attempt a similar experiment.

I'm definitely going to be doing similar comparisons for any yeast I intend to use regularly.