Champagne Yeast for Beer?

Anybody use champagne yeast for beer fermentation?

Look up the Sunday Session interview with Shea Comfort. There's a pile of info about why wine yeasts are potentially good and bad for beer fermentations. I just used a red wine yeast to start my first funk beer because wine yeasts leave a lot of residual sugars when fermenting wort. They are incapable of fermenting maltotriose.

El_Exorcisto said:

Look up the Sunday Session interview with Shea Comfort. There's a pile of info about why wine yeasts are potentially good and bad for beer fermentations. I just used a red wine yeast to start my first funk beer because wine yeasts leave a lot of residual sugars when fermenting wort. They are incapable of fermenting maltotriose.

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Wow, that is really interesting. Could you outline what you did a little? Your sig says spontaneously fermented, so did you use the wine yeast to ferment it the first way to avoid all the potentially bad things like enterobacteria?

The thread about it is in the Wild forum, called "First Funk, Thoughts?" I'm using wine yeast as the primary fermentation yeast because it is reported to give some very big berry jam flavors and leaves a LOT to be desired in the attenuation department in beer. Once the primary ferment is complete I am racking it to secondary along with a slurry taken from a pail that my father and I use to ferment corn and barley for our chickens. The slurry smells buttery and full of pineapple and guava, so it should make for some interesting funk. Once the secondary fermentation is complete I'm going to rack it onto 5 lbs of blueberries I picked over the summer, or maybe some fresh fruit since it'll be 6 months out anyway.

El Ex -

I'm not trying to be a ******, but I think you should check out this study regarding your sig. http://www.foodinnova.com/foodInnova/docu2/322.pdf . They tested plastic for oxygen permeability and found that a 190L tank allows 2.15mg/L of dissolved O2 in per month. For beer, you want less than 0.05mg/L of dissolved O2 to prevent premature staling. Obviously the 190L has more surface area, and thus will let in more O2, but it is still quite a bit.

I have a very low taste threshold for oxidation and noticed a huge difference when I switched to glass carboys from plastic buckets. I don't leave my beer more than 2-3 weeks in the fermenter and was still getting oxidation in the plastic.

Like I said, I'm not trying to be a ******, I just want to prevent misinformation on the forum.

MachineShop, you apparently have a rare talent for not even having to try. BJCP competitions are won often by brewers using plastic buckets to ferment in. The argument has been beaten to death on these forums and continuing it, especially by hijacking someone else's thread, is demonstrating just how talented you are.

MachineShop, you apparently have a rare talent for not even having to try.

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Thanks for calling me a ******

BJCP competitions are won often by brewers using plastic buckets to ferment in.

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I agree. I have won bjcp comps while fermenting in buckets.

The argument has been beaten to death on these forums and continuing it, especially by hijacking someone else's thread, is demonstrating just how talented you are.

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I agree also. I will start a new thread. Equating the oxygen permeability required for human life and that required to stale beer is a huge leap in logic, and qualifies as misinformation in my book. Sorry.

Champagne yeast also typically ferments very dry, which I wouldn't want in most styles of beer.

TopherM said:

Champagne yeast also typically ferments very dry, which I wouldn't want in most styles of beer.

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Bzzz wrong. Haha, I'm seriously not trying to be a ******. Champagne yeast can't ferment maltotriose. So it actually will leave you with a very sweet beer. Listen to that interview with Shea Comfort, it was one of the most interesting things I've heard in a while.

Rex is right, listen to the Sunday Session with Shea. I just listened to it late last week, so it is fresh in my mind. Champagne yeast will ferment champagne dry, not beer.

Weird....my experience with Champagne yeast for is hard cider, which is also ferments dry, so that's what I was drawing on. Interesting that beer chemistry works differently when it comes to that yeast.

Weird....my experience with Champagne yeast for is hard cider, which is also ferments dry, so that's what I was drawing on. Interesting that beer chemistry works differently when it comes to that yeast.

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yeah, totally different sugar composition.

MachineShopBrewing said:

yeah, totally different sugar composition.

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Exactly. Most ale yeasts will also ferment cider dry; it's mostly simple sugars.

Juices are composed almost exclusively of glucose and fructose, which any yeast can ferment completely. Wine yeasts that make for a more full bodied wine actually produce polysaccharides that wort already has built in.

I understand my signature involves a touch of hyperbole. So do the majority of topics discussed here.

El_Exorcisto said:

I'm using wine yeast as the primary fermentation yeast because it is reported to give some very big berry jam flavors and leaves a LOT to be desired in the attenuation department in beer. Once the primary ferment is complete I am racking it to secondary along with a slurry taken from a pail that my father and I use to ferment corn and barley for our chickens. The slurry smells buttery and full of pineapple and guava, so it should make for some interesting funk. Once the secondary fermentation is complete I'm going to rack it onto 5 lbs of blueberries I picked over the summer, or maybe some fresh fruit since it'll be 6 months out anyway.

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Sounds absolutely gross. I bet it tastes fantastic!

rexbanner said:

Champagne yeast can't ferment maltotriose. So it actually will leave you with a very sweet beer. Listen to that interview with Shea Comfort, it was one of the most interesting things I've heard in a while.

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I've been telling people that on this forum for the past 6 months, but keep being shot down. I hope they all read that article.

TopherM said:

Weird....my experience with Champagne yeast for is hard cider, which is also ferments dry, so that's what I was drawing on. Interesting that beer chemistry works differently when it comes to that yeast.

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Apple juice is almost completely simple sugars. Bread yeast would probably do a decent job on it.