any1 ever use VINTNER'S HARVEST YEAST CR51?

[zev]

in a beer? Im thinkin of making a red rye or wheat with this yeast and possibly adding some fruit puree to the secondary.

the description is:
Perfect for light, fruity red wines for early consumption.

CR51 will enhance ripe berry fruit flavours in light and fruity red wines and introduce a velvet texture perfect for Valpolicella and especially for Beaujolais style wines. This strain has an almost unique ability to confer a smooth even ‘silky’ quality to the wine, perfect for early consumption young reds. CR51 is a medium rate fermenter with optimal temperature between 22 to 30oC (72 -86oF) which will ferment to 13.5% abv. ethanol. Low to medium foaming strain with low volatile acid and SO2 production.

Suitable with: Plum, Raspberry, Strawberry, Pinot Noir, Gamay

 

[daksin]

Wine yeasts aren't going to ferment beer properly. Wine yeast is evolved to only eat simple sugars like fructose, sucrose, and glucose. Most of the sugars in beer are larger sugars and more complex ones, like maltose. You will end up with a woefully underattenuated beer.

 

[zev]

yes i know that wine yeast will not eat maltotriose(sp) so i have planned on mashing low (146) and putting 1/3 in a seperate carboy to use the wine yeast on which will underattenuate, and ferment the other 2/3 with a high attenuating beer yeast ( maybe super san diego yeast), and then blend the two. ive also listened to the BREWING NETWORK poscast where they talk about a additive called CONVERTASE which can be added to the fermentor to convert all sugars into simple sugars that the wine yeast can eat.

 

[daksin]

That seems like a ton of work for something that isn't going to taste very good. You're welcome to try but I'm going to go out and say I would strongly discourage it. If you're looking for fruity esters that go well with beer, why not use a yeast that's known for them, like a hefeweizen, witbier, or saison yeast. The flavors of wine and the flavors of beer are substantially different. You see beers mixed with fruit juices and mead all the time, braggots and cysers and things like that, but you don't ever see beer/wine cocktails. If you have to add enzymes to a beer to make it work, you need to re-evaluate your recipe. It doesn't sound like you can be convinced, though, so do what you're going to do. One wonders why you asked for others' opinions.

 

[zev]

i appreciate ure opinion, but I really didnt ask for it. i asked if any1 has ever used vitners harvest CR51 yeast in a beer, not IF I SHOULD DO IT. I was planning on doing it the whole time, I was just looking for others who might have had used that particular yeast and what the results were. being that there is a brew network podcast of this specific topic, Im sure Im not the only one who has ever wanted/tried this technique to create DIFFERENT flavor profiles by blending different yeasts, especially on a homebrew forum where new techniques and such keep this site going forward. Many world class beers are blended and aged in wine barrels so thats not an issue u should discourage. and its really not a "ton of work" considering i split most of my batches in two carboys anyways...here is the link to that podcast if ure up for it

http://s125483039.onlinehome.us/archive/dwnldarchive11-23-08.mp3