Champagne yeast in beer

[TomFogarty]

Hey guys, I just started on a new project and I just wanted to get some feedback on it.

Two days ago I tossed a batch of beer together, sort of a hybrid of a rauch beer and an abbey ale, and wanted to bump the alcohol up a touch. The SG was 1.092 and I pitched a pack of Wyeast Kolsch yeast. I don't expect the Kolsch yeast to ferment all the sugars since its tolerance is only about 10% ABV, but it started to bubble away this morning after about 36 hours of lag time.

My question is this: what sort of flavours could I expect if I were to finish it and condition the beer with Lalvin K1-V1116 wine yeast? It might be difficult to get it going under these conditions, but I figure with a decent starter it shouldn't be an issue.

Another option would be to pitch a malt whiskey yeast. I was given a few kilos of Anchor yeast but I know nothing of its tolerance as far as alcohol goes, I just know it's a powerhouse of a yeast. My only concern with that is that it is meant to be used for distilled beverages and may produce a higher concentration of congeners. While I do enjoy rich, estery qualities in a beer, I'd hazzard a guess and say this would give one killer hangover.

Cheers!
Tom

 

[TTB-J]

I've had experience in using Champagne yeast in finishing off meads, but I've yet to need it in an ale. My experience on the mead side is that the champagne yeast won't alter the flavor profile very much - it's a very aggressive yeast, but it's designed to ferment clean. The only issue I've heard of is with champagne yeast being so aggressive that it excessively drys out the beer and gives it a lot of that hot alcohol taste. But that's easy enough to take care off - just keep an eye on it and rack it off the yeast once it gets down to the gravity you were targeting.

Sorry I don't have more experience on this, but I hope some of my random thoughts were helpful.

 

[user 4295]

I had bottled an Imperial Stout several years ago. After a year in the bottle they were still flat. There obviously wasn't enough viable yeast left, due to the high alcohol content, to carb in the bottle and the unfermented priming sugar had made it undrinkable even if I had decided to pour all the bottles in a keg to force carb it. My only option was to take the risk of adding a small amount of champagne yeast to each bottle and hope for the best. After about two more months, PERFECTION!!!

 

[friday]

I used an 1118 to finish a high gravity stout and it scored a bronze. The finish seemed to be pretty neutral, but there is no telling what a yeast will do when you pitch it into low ph environment.

 

[akimbo78]

its a common for strong belgians. look up 100% bottle refermentation. i'll be adding champagne yeast to my strong dark belgian in another month. its been aging for 3. i'll be adding it 3 days prior to bottling per the instructions.

 

[dcp27]

the wine yeast won't do much. those yeasts are cultured for simple sugars and don't do well with the more complex sugars found in beers. their only real use in beer is for carbonation. the kolsch yeast would have been fine alone, but since you underpitched it, you may not get as low as desired

 

[TomFogarty]

Great feedback for the champagne yeast!
I doubt I'll bother with it, but does anyone have any experience with whiskey yeasts? I'm very curious to see what kind of profile it would add to a beer.

TTB-J, you mentioned champagne yeast gives the beer a dry taste and I should rack it off the yeast once the target gravity is attained, but would that make much difference seeing as I'd be using that same yeast to bottle condition anyway?

 

[daksin]

One thing to know is that champagne yeast can really only work on simple sugars, not the longer chain sugars beer yeasts get around to eating later in the fermentation. If your fermenation has stalled out due to lots of complex sugars still in solution (lots of specialty grains), champagne yeast won't help. If it's solely a high alcohol issue, and there are plenty of simple sugars left, champagne yeast can help those dry out a bit.