Isolated Yeast (Tree House): How to Identify and Characterize?

[Clyde McCoy]

"Curiosity One Hundred is brewed with Huell Melon, Strata, Citra, and Galaxy hops and utilizes our irreplicable House yeast"

From a marketing perspective, I can see how Tree House might prefer "our irreplicable House yeast" to "Fermentis S-04."

It would be nice if Nate saved me the time testing his beers, but if I were a pro brewer I'd also want to protect my recipes .

 

[troxerX]

The hard part about reading into Curiosity batches is that they're supposed to deviate from normal practices. I will say though, that the language used in Curiosity 100 does make it seem like they're blending yeasts. The thing is, if you take language from across all the posts, it's impossible to discern whether there's a blend or not in the non-Curiosity beers.

Agreed, that’s their higher risk creative venue, I gave them my permission to go ahead and blend yeasts.

@NJGeorge probably someone already posted this here too, but if you feel lucky on brew day, why not toss T-58 @80F or even at @100F?? yeast stress is all there is if you are looking for it - phenols galore - who knows if this is the 2011 video that got the Julius secret process started LOL...



@NJGeorge Kidding aside, there is probably hundreds of posts in this thread about this - one of the issues I’ve been seeing in other blogs is that the Julius clone attempts that are brewed with only T-58 and/or WB-06 taste good initially but then fade quickly as the beers keep turning more into hoppy saisons. This is where CBC-1 added at the right time may come to play at inhibiting these yeast from further activity. Something to think about.

https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/julius-clone-from-zymurgy-magazine.626661/
@MrPowers are you planning on brewing your idea?

 

[MrPowers]

@MrPowers are you planning on brewing your idea?

I’ve been thinking about brewing it, but I have a few other beers on my to brew list first. It’ll probably be a couple months before I get around to it. I did just tack on the T58 and WB06 to my last order, so that’s a little progress.

That said, I’m not sure a lot of value is added in my brewing it, because I don’t have access to any TH to compare it to. By the time I get around to it, the last time I will have had any TH will have been well over a year. My memory for flavors is pretty good, but I’d like to be able to offer a bit more concrete comparison than that.

If someone who has access to TH would be willing to give it a shot, I’d be happy to give them a step by step of the brewday/fermentation process I had in mind.

 

[NJGeorge]

Agreed, that’s their higher risk creative venue, I gave them my permission to go ahead and blend yeasts.

@NJGeorge probably someone already posted this here too, but if you feel lucky on brew day, why not toss T-58 @80F or even at @100F?? yeast stress is all there is if you are looking for it - phenols galore - who knows if this is the 2011 video that got the Julius secret process started LOL...



@NJGeorge Kidding aside, there is probably hundreds of posts in this thread about this - one of the issues I’ve been seeing in other blogs is that the Julius clone attempts that are brewed with only T-58 and/or WB-06 taste good initially but then fade quickly as the beers keep turning more into hoppy saisons. This is where CBC-1 added at the right time may come to play at inhibiting these yeast from further activity. Something to think about.

https://www.beeradvocate.com/community/threads/julius-clone-from-zymurgy-magazine.626661/
@MrPowers are you planning on brewing your idea?

The thing is, we know they are not fermenting at high temps. We’re also still not 100% positive that the yeast they use are the ones we are discussing.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/famous...e-juice-decoding-what-yeast-is-in-julius/amp/This guy found three yeast but only thought one was wb-06 so who knows really. I still think wine yeasts should be tested more.

 

[TheHairyHop]

Not exactly the point of this thread, but I made an IPA with Enigma and S-33, and I would 100% make this again. Loads of peach and orange. This keg will be gone in no time

 

[couchsending]

Not exactly the point of this thread, but I made an IPA with Enigma and S-33, and I would 100% make this again. Loads of peach and orange. This keg will be gone in no time

no weird bready notes from the yeast?

 

[TheHairyHop]

no weird bready notes from the yeast?

Not that I picked up at lunch time haha. I'll sit down with it more this evening. It's my first IPA with chit malt, so it'll take a bit of finagling to pick out those flavors from any yeast/bread notes. I carbed with S-04, so I was honestly expecting a bready tang bomb. Never happened though

 

[TheHairyHop]

no weird bready notes from the yeast?

After spending more time tasting, letting the beer warm, etc, I can't detect any yeasty or bready flavors that I would consider off. I can't taste any phenols either. Is S-33 not POF?

 

[couchsending]

After spending more time tasting, letting the beer warm, etc, I can't detect any yeasty or bready flavors that I would consider off. I can't taste any phenols either. Is S-33 not POF?

it’s POF-

 

[Clyde McCoy]

Tree House jjjuliusss

Canned: June 17, 2020
Analyzed: August 2020

Serial dilutions on WLN agar indicate multiple strains:

Screening 8 colonies, each chosen for unique size and/or color:

7/8 colonies appear to be S-04-like, not sure about lane 6.

Surprisingly several colonies of different color turned out to be S-04-like, so the culture may have less diversity than the plates above suggest.

 

[NJGeorge]

Tree House jjjuliusss

Canned: June 17, 2020
Analyzed: August 2020

Serial dilutions on WLN agar indicate multiple strains:

View attachment 695334

Screening 8 colonies, each chosen for unique size and/or color:

View attachment 695394

7/8 colonies appear to be S-04-like, not sure about lane 6.

Surprisingly several colonies of different color turned out to be S-04-like, so the culture may have less diversity than the plates above suggest.

Good stuff! Will you be brewing a batch from any of these strains?

 

[Clyde McCoy]

Relatively new can (July 14, 2020) of Very Green matches S-04, in contrast to the old can (October 2019) which matched T-58. I need to screen more colonies but it looks like at the time of plating, the new can is almost exclusively S-04. Maybe T-58 takes over after months in the can?

Still screening jjjuliusss. I've looked at ~40 colonies. Almost all colonies match S-04. I may have found rare F-2, WB-06, T-58 colonies but I need to run them side-by-side with the controls to be sure. Going by the images in my last post, the large beige colonies tend to test as something other than S-04, but not always. I was hoping the WLN was going to make this easy but S-04 comes in many shapes and colors!

I'm still thinking about mix-strain fermentation, but I also might speculate that I'm detecting contamination - gasp - in Tree House's repitch of S-04 or in what they buy from Fermentis. At this point I'm really not sure, despite screening ~100 colonies so far.

S-04 is almost certainly their "irreplicable House yeast", but the role of the other Fermentis strains still isn't clear.

 

[beervoid]

Relatively new can (July 14, 2020) of Very Green matches S-04, in contrast to the old can (October 2019) which matched T-58. I need to screen more colonies but it looks like at the time of plating, the new can is almost exclusively S-04. Maybe T-58 takes over after months in the can?

View attachment 696115

Still screening jjjuliusss. I've looked at ~40 colonies. Almost all colonies match S-04. I may have found rare F-2, WB-06, T-58 colonies but I need to run them side-by-side with the controls to be sure. Going by the images in my last post, the large beige colonies tend to test as something other than S-04, but not always. I was hoping the WLN was going to make this easy but S-04 comes in many shapes and colors!

I'm still thinking about mix-strain fermentation, but I also might speculate that I'm detecting contamination - gasp - in Tree House's repitch of S-04 or in what they buy from Fermentis. At this point I'm really not sure, despite screening ~100 colonies so far.

S-04 is almost certainly their "irreplicable House yeast", but the role of the other Fermentis strains still isn't clear.

I searched a bit about s-04 esters. Some people report banana at high temps. Banana might be tasted as bubblegum for some.
Since we speculate they ferment at 65f im guessing they pitch on the warmer side 70+ and let it cool down to 65 to finish off. That wil def stress the yeast alot.
Here is an old thread.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/s-04-carbonation-bananas.168786/

 

[Passa194]

So I have been one of those longtime lurkers. Thank you all for your hard work. I just want to add that I did use s04 in a citra Amarillo hopped NEIPA I made and I didn’t control my temps for this batch. Temps had to hit the low 70’s if not higher, and it was straight banana. I fortunately am only an hour drive from Treehouse and will make quarterly trips out there. I recently brewed with the trio yeast blend and the aroma is on point. If I could just eliminate the clove. I think we are close and I’m willing to provide cans for the cause. I only been brewing for a couple years so the only help I have is to donate TH cans for the cause. Cheers! and thanks again for your work!

 

[Clyde McCoy]

This is an interesting Q&A with Chris White (White Labs) from 2003:

Q: Do I add the strains in the beginning or staggered?

A: Depends what you want. When yeast is pitched into beer, it starts to grow, entering into a log phase of growth after a few hours. This is when the bulk of the flavor compounds are produced. 12-36 hours into the fermentation. Therefore, if your goal is flavor, you need to add the multiple strains early on, preferably together. Note that if you just want another strain for bottling, or to complete attenuation, go ahead and add later. Very little flavor contribution happens here, unless the beer undergoes prolonged ageing.

Q: Won’t it be hard to collect the yeast?

A: Yes and no. It will be hard to collect the same percentage every time, but we don’t use yeast that much anyway. It won’t change that much over 5 to 10 generations. And if you only go 3 or 4, it is not that much extra of a cost if you get your target results.

 

[beervoid]

I searched a bit about s-04 esters. Some people report banana at high temps. Banana might be tasted as bubblegum for some.
Here is an old thread.
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/threads/s-04-carbonation-bananas.168786/

Since t

So I have been one of those longtime lurkers. Thank you all for your hard work. I just want to add that I did use s04 in a citra Amarillo hopped NEIPA I made and I didn’t control my temps for this batch. Temps had to hit the low 70’s if not higher, and it was straight banana. I fortunately am only an hour drive from Treehouse and will make quarterly trips out there. I recently brewed with the trio yeast blend and the aroma is on point. If I could just eliminate the clove. I think we are close and I’m willing to provide cans for the cause. I only been brewing for a couple years so the only help I have is to donate TH cans for the cause. Cheers! and thanks again for your work!

Clove comes from ferulic acid so perhaps that why tree house doesnt use any wheat? Try to prevent clove from t58. I also read ferment temps matter but I dont remember at what temp t58 seems to produce most clove. I think it was lower temps

 

[Clyde McCoy]

Since t

Clove comes from ferulic acid so perhaps that why tree house doesnt use any wheat? Try to prevent clove from t58. I also read ferment temps matter but I dont remember at what temp t58 seems to produce most clove. I think it was lower temps

This is an old photo (not mine) of Tree House's temperature controller:

I'm guessing primary is 62 or 66F. Because (most) homebrewers aren't using a glycol jacketed unitank, 55-60F ambient in a fermentation chamber is probably a reasonable estimation.

 

[beervoid]

This is an old photo (not mine) of Tree House's temperature controller:

View attachment 696227

I'm guessing primary is 62 or 66F. Because (most) homebrewers aren't using a glycol jacketed unitank, 55-60F ambient in a fermentation chamber is probably a reasonable estimation.

I see 2 temps at 220 for green nr. Free rise?
One tank is at 70f

 

[Clyde McCoy]

These are some of the rare non-S-04 colonies. There appears to be 4 distinct banding patterns.

If you’re convinced that Tree House is doing mix-strain fermentations (I’m undecided), I would try using WB-06 and T-58 in very small amounts, co-pitched with S-04 at the start of fermentation. I would try as little as 95/2.5/2.5 or 96/2/2. In my experience S-04 is very vigorous and really nasty if it gets too hot, so I would start at ~55-60F and then rise after 2-3 days.

These strains show up so infrequently that I still think a contaminated pitch is possible.

 

[isomerization]

View attachment 696291

These are some of the rare non-S-04 colonies. There appears to be 4 distinct banding patterns.

If you’re convinced that Tree House is doing mix-strain fermentations (I’m undecided), I would try using WB-06 and T-58 in very small amounts, co-pitched with S-04 at the start of fermentation. I would try as little as 95/2.5/2.5 or 96/2/2. In my experience S-04 is very vigorous and really nasty if it gets too hot, so I would start at ~55-60F and then rise after 2-3 days.

These strains show up so infrequently that I still think a contaminated pitch is possible.

How many colonies have you tested in total from this can and how many were not S-04?

 

[Clyde McCoy]

How many colonies have you tested in total from this can and how many were not S-04?

About ~50 but the sampling is skewed now that I'm specifically screening the large beige colonies (circled), which are often (but not always) something that doesn't match S-04. Large beige colonies with green center and everything else is almost always S-04. Anyone care to count some colonies?

jjjuliusss:

They stand out because they're large but in terms of their fraction of the total?

 

[Clyde McCoy]

This is Very Green (canned July 14, 2020):

I need to screen this plate but I'm guessing that everything except the large beige colonies are S-04.

 

[isomerization]

About ~50 but the sampling is skewed now that I'm specifically screening the large beige colonies (circled), which are often (but not always) something that doesn't match S-04. Large beige colonies with green center and everything else is almost always S-04. Anyone care to count some colonies?

jjjuliusss:

View attachment 696299

They stand out because they're large but in terms of their fraction of the total?

Pretty wild how different some of the colors are for presumably the same strain of S-04. With that said, if we’re arguing for a 20+:1 ratio of S-04 to other strains, seems pretty close based on that image.

 

[Noob_Brewer]

So I carbed it up and this beer is SOFT and THICK on the palette. It still has that very fruity wine like thing going on but it’s very enjoyable to drink. My best guess is that the 71B is really contributing to the mouthfeel due to the high levels of glycerol it produces. I think I’ll try playing with some different combos going forward...both yeast combos and ratios. My next brew is going to be with omegas version of 1318 so maybe I’ll try that whole pack and 2 or 3 grams of 71B.

@HopsAreGood curious now how you felt like this beer turned out after full conditioning. Did this have any "staying power" in terms of flavor and/or aroma? Did your mosaic ever come through or did the yeast esters stay the primary flavor for you? If I remember from going through this thread that you fermented at 64 and let rise to 66? does that sound right? Thinking of trying this at 70/30% with S04/71B myself as you did. Just wanted to pick your brain on it since Im sure now that keg has kicked for you lol. Thanks

 

[HopsAreGood]

@HopsAreGood curious now how you felt like this beer turned out after full conditioning. Did this have any "staying power" in terms of flavor and/or aroma? Did your mosaic ever come through or did the yeast esters stay the primary flavor for you? If I remember from going through this thread that you fermented at 64 and let rise to 66? does that sound right? Thinking of trying this at 70/30% with S04/71B myself as you did. Just wanted to pick your brain on it since Im sure now that keg has kicked for you lol. Thanks

I ended up dumping it about halfway through. Not so much because it was terrible but because I only have two kegs and I needed one for a beer that was ready. It was OK but really not all that great. It remained verry wine like and it kind of transformed while it aged a little bit. Not into something that was extremely desirable. I do think there’s some pretty cool things that can be done with wine yeast, but the ratio of 70/30 was definitely too high for my liking.

It was interesting because to me it really tasted a lot like a fruity white wine, but one of my friends who knows beer quite well said it tasted Belgiany, Which after he said that I could kind of pick it up as well. Another person who tried it said it tasted like pineapple with some white wine. I offered to let @NJGeorge try some because he lives within a reasonable distance, but he declined. Haha.

Everyone’s palate is different, but if I were to try this again I would definitely use a much smaller percentage of the wine yeast.

In terms of the mosaic, nope. I absolutely could not detect any of it at any time drinking it.

 

[beervoid]

I ended up dumping it about halfway through. Not so much because it was terrible but because I only have two kegs and I needed one for a beer that was ready. It was OK but really not all that great. It remained verry wine like and it kind of transformed while it aged a little bit. Not into something that was extremely desirable. I do think there’s some pretty cool things that can be done with wine yeast, but the ratio of 70/30 was definitely too high for my liking.

It was interesting because to me it really tasted a lot like a fruity white wine, but one of my friends who knows beer quite well said it tasted Belgiany, Which after he said that I could kind of pick it up as well. Another person who tried it said it tasted like pineapple with some white wine. I offered to let @NJGeorge try some because he lives within a reasonable distance, but he declined. Haha.

Everyone’s palate is different, but if I were to try this again I would definitely use a much smaller percentage of the wine yeast.

In terms of the mosaic, nope. I absolutely could not detect any of it at any time drinking it.

Pretty much the same experience for me and I used less then you.

 

[Northern_Brewer]

Relatively new can (July 14, 2020) of Very Green matches S-04, in contrast to the old can (October 2019) which matched T-58. I need to screen more colonies but it looks like at the time of plating, the new can is almost exclusively S-04. Maybe T-58 takes over after months in the can?

It's certainly not implausible, it certainly seems to be one of the most vigorous yeasts I know in terms of hitting a fermentation running, so it may be active at low temperatures in a way that others are not. Or just generally tougher.

 

[NJGeorge]

If it’s s04 that is mainly in the can then why are people having problems fermenting with TH can dregs? Wouldnt the s04 take over and beat out anything else that’s maybe in there? Also from my experience it’s wb that gets very clovey and not T-58.

 

[troxerX]

@MrPowers I feel your pain brotha, I’m in PA and finding TH is always difficult.. maybe some folks should be sending us cans for charity

I’ve said it before and will continue to do so — TH is a modern style blending and krausening experiment — There is no other way you will achieve their mouthfeel and complexity, sometimes opposing bready and fruity characteristics with a unidimensional/unidirectional process, otherwise everyone else will be brewing beers like them. How Firestone Walker produce such amazing barrel aged stouts? ever wondered why all top rated beers in the world are mostly barrel aged stouts?, how New Belgium, Oskar Blues and even Dogfish Head keep consistency of their flagships?, How Big Beer, and some Large Craft control their quality and yet keeping simple processes and achieve their consistency day in and day out?. Blending is still in its modern infancy despite being such an old technique and unfortunately most people see it as a means of correcting flaws or for open fermented or barrel based styles but there is much more to it, and it’s all around us. All the best breweries in the world achieve their complexity and yet simplicity through blending synergy and TH is no exception, they just found a way to do it with a modern style of beer and while everyone else keeps brewing unidimensionally they’ll always be at the top.

With all the evidence we’ve found all these years, there is no question their beers have multiple yeasts phenotypes and yet their final product is a perfect balance of each one’s properties. Malt wise, we know they use different malts that may not even make sense putting all in one wort without being too complex — the list goes on. The biggest complain of all clone attempts is the phenolic spice train wreck caused by the POF+. Independent of which permutation you pursue, when you co-pitch yeasts of different styles unidimensionally (1 wort) you lose control and it’s all for grabs... yeast decide for you that day, will you take that risk with a multimillion dollar facility?? you can have luck for a couple days just to see your brew go south, complains keep going on and on. Fermenting separately allow the yeasts to run their course on their own direction, but yet you are still in control of the final product and yet simple enough you can achieve with 1 mash tun, 1 kettle and 2 fermentation vessels. Want to get rid of the phenolic wreck? ferment a German weiss separately, crash the yeast at almost 0C as you see in the controller pics, and blend into the already fermented S04 blonde followed with the pale ale krausening addition (or wathever other combination).. this type of approach gives you control... maybe why T-58 barely shows on the final product?, I can keep going on and on...

I don’t want people to think this is the exact solution but we need to start getting out of our comfort zone if we want to get to the bottom of this, and by leveraging simple processes where we can achieve a product aligned with the evidence we know so far, and that only can be done as a team effort.

For the sci-fi geeks, some fun quote from S.R Hadden and totally applicable here LOL - “pages and pages of data, over 63,000 and all, and on the perimeter of each... they do, if you think like a Vega’n.. an alien intelligence got to be more advanced, that means efficiency and functioning at multiple levels, and, in multiple dimensions..”

Cheers!

https://www.gearpatrol.com/food/drinks/a462014/how-brewers-use-beer-blending-techniques/
https://www.homebrewcon.org/wp-content/uploads/presentations/2007/MBPresentation.pdf
https://www.google.com/amp/s/beerandbrewing.com/amp/when-to-blend-your-beer/
https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/how-to-brew/the-art-of-blending-beer/

 

[echoALEia]

@MrPowers I feel your pain brotha, I’m in PA and finding TH is always difficult.. maybe some folks should be sending us cans for charity

I’ve said it before and will continue to do so — TH is a modern style blending and krausening experiment — There is no other way you will achieve their mouthfeel and complexity, sometimes opposing bready and fruity characteristics with a unidimensional/unidirectional process, otherwise everyone else will be brewing beers like them. How Firestone Walker produce such amazing barrel aged stouts? ever wondered why all top rated beers in the world are mostly barrel aged stouts?, how New Belgium, Oskar Blues and even Dogfish Head keep consistency of their flagships?, How Big Beer, and some Large Craft control their quality and yet keeping simple processes and achieve their consistency day in and day out?. Blending is still in its modern infancy despite being such an old technique and unfortunately most people see it as a means of correcting flaws or for open fermented or barrel based styles but there is much more to it, and it’s all around us. All the best breweries in the world achieve their complexity and yet simplicity through blending synergy and TH is no exception, they just found a way to do it with a modern style of beer and while everyone else keeps brewing unidimensionally they’ll always be at the top.

With all the evidence we’ve found all these years, there is no question their beers have multiple yeasts phenotypes and yet their final product is a perfect balance of each one’s properties. Malt wise, we know they use different malts that may not even make sense putting all in one wort without being too complex — the list goes on. The biggest complain of all clone attempts is the phenolic spice train wreck caused by the POF+. Independent of which permutation you pursue, when you co-pitch yeasts of different styles unidimensionally (1 wort) you lose control and it’s all for grabs... yeast decide for you that day, will you take that risk with a multimillion dollar facility?? you can have luck for a couple days just to see your brew go south, complains keep going on and on. Fermenting separately allow the yeasts to run their course on their own direction, but yet you are still in control of the final product and yet simple enough you can achieve with 1 mash tun, 1 kettle and 2 fermentation vessels. Want to get rid of the phenolic wreck? ferment a German weiss separately, crash the yeast at almost 0C as you see in the controller pics, and blend into the already fermented S04 blonde followed with the pale ale krausening addition (or wathever other combination).. this type of approach gives you control... maybe why T-58 barely shows on the final product?, I can keep going on and on...

I don’t want people to think this is the exact solution but we need to start getting out of our comfort zone if we want to get to the bottom of this, and by leveraging simple processes where we can achieve a product aligned with the evidence we know so far, and that only can be done as a team effort.

For the sci-fi geeks, some fun quote from S.R Hadden and totally applicable here LOL - “pages and pages of data, over 63,000 and all, and on the perimeter of each... they do, if you think like a Vega’n.. an alien intelligence got to be more advanced, that means efficiency and functioning at multiple levels, and, in multiple dimensions..”

Cheers!

https://www.gearpatrol.com/food/drinks/a462014/how-brewers-use-beer-blending-techniques/
https://www.homebrewcon.org/wp-content/uploads/presentations/2007/MBPresentation.pdf
https://www.google.com/amp/s/beerandbrewing.com/amp/when-to-blend-your-beer/
https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/how-to-brew/the-art-of-blending-beer/

Good points! I think I follow you on insta, your stuff looks good. I personally agree that they are probably blending batches/kausening- I hit on it in my older posts. I got the flavor pretty close from my own experiments - still have some kinks to work out but I’m pretty close to there.

Just one thing to touch on - krausening doesn’t get rid of phenolic wrecks! I recently did an all Galaxy TIPA with mostly T-58 and a touch of Wb-06 and it was a nightmare - huge clove bomb. I did 3 separate spiesse with dry hops and 3 separate English yeasts (LAIII, S33, & 007) with my hop cannon - nothing fixed it - it was just a little less clovey and insanely bitter. My fix for it was brewing a 5% mosaic and Citra pale ale and blending the two (25% of the clove bomb) with f2 for carbonation. The mouthfeel was unbelievable and I was happy with the results.

I don’t think yeast blends at pitching are bad at this style either. The Farmhouse NEIPA blend from Omega is probably the best I’ve ever used and I saved it for 5-6 generations.

 

[LumberZach]

I had my first Tree House back in early 2015 when they were still brewing out of Monson. Their flagships (Green, Julius, and Haze) were quite a bit better than they are now.

 

[dmtaylor]

Clove comes from ferulic acid so perhaps that why tree house doesnt use any wheat? Try to prevent clove from t58. I also read ferment temps matter but I dont remember at what temp t58 seems to produce most clove. I think it was lower temps

Ferulic acid comes more from barley than from wheat though.

https://braumagazin.de/article/brewing-bavarian-weissbier-all-you-ever-wanted-to-know/

 

[NJGeorge]

I had my first Tree House back in early 2015 when they were still brewing out of Monson. Their flagships (Green, Julius, and Haze) were quite a bit better than they are now.

Seems like the beer is much more hazy now. I had it at Monson in 2016 and it was amazing. Had that amazing melon ester. So whatever they were doing back then, they are doing now. But if you look at older pics of their beer, some are clear looking. I also think they are doing something with another yeast for the natural carbonation. Krausening of some sort and or blending. What’s the fastest way to naturally carbonate? I’ve also seen pics in Monson of them using a hop canon so they must use that to dry hop. Can you krausen/dry hop with one of those?

 

[beervoid]

Ferulic acid comes more from barley than from wheat though.

https://braumagazin.de/article/brewing-bavarian-weissbier-all-you-ever-wanted-to-know/

Strange I cant open the link but I read the opposite.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/14759156/

 

[beervoid]

@MrPowers I feel your pain brotha, I’m in PA and finding TH is always difficult.. maybe some folks should be sending us cans for charity

I’ve said it before and will continue to do so — TH is a modern style blending and krausening experiment — There is no other way you will achieve their mouthfeel and complexity, sometimes opposing bready and fruity characteristics with a unidimensional/unidirectional process, otherwise everyone else will be brewing beers like them. How Firestone Walker produce such amazing barrel aged stouts? ever wondered why all top rated beers in the world are mostly barrel aged stouts?, how New Belgium, Oskar Blues and even Dogfish Head keep consistency of their flagships?, How Big Beer, and some Large Craft control their quality and yet keeping simple processes and achieve their consistency day in and day out?. Blending is still in its modern infancy despite being such an old technique and unfortunately most people see it as a means of correcting flaws or for open fermented or barrel based styles but there is much more to it, and it’s all around us. All the best breweries in the world achieve their complexity and yet simplicity through blending synergy and TH is no exception, they just found a way to do it with a modern style of beer and while everyone else keeps brewing unidimensionally they’ll always be at the top.

With all the evidence we’ve found all these years, there is no question their beers have multiple yeasts phenotypes and yet their final product is a perfect balance of each one’s properties. Malt wise, we know they use different malts that may not even make sense putting all in one wort without being too complex — the list goes on. The biggest complain of all clone attempts is the phenolic spice train wreck caused by the POF+. Independent of which permutation you pursue, when you co-pitch yeasts of different styles unidimensionally (1 wort) you lose control and it’s all for grabs... yeast decide for you that day, will you take that risk with a multimillion dollar facility?? you can have luck for a couple days just to see your brew go south, complains keep going on and on. Fermenting separately allow the yeasts to run their course on their own direction, but yet you are still in control of the final product and yet simple enough you can achieve with 1 mash tun, 1 kettle and 2 fermentation vessels. Want to get rid of the phenolic wreck? ferment a German weiss separately, crash the yeast at almost 0C as you see in the controller pics, and blend into the already fermented S04 blonde followed with the pale ale krausening addition (or wathever other combination).. this type of approach gives you control... maybe why T-58 barely shows on the final product?, I can keep going on and on...

I don’t want people to think this is the exact solution but we need to start getting out of our comfort zone if we want to get to the bottom of this, and by leveraging simple processes where we can achieve a product aligned with the evidence we know so far, and that only can be done as a team effort.

For the sci-fi geeks, some fun quote from S.R Hadden and totally applicable here LOL - “pages and pages of data, over 63,000 and all, and on the perimeter of each... they do, if you think like a Vega’n.. an alien intelligence got to be more advanced, that means efficiency and functioning at multiple levels, and, in multiple dimensions..”

Cheers!

https://www.gearpatrol.com/food/drinks/a462014/how-brewers-use-beer-blending-techniques/
https://www.homebrewcon.org/wp-content/uploads/presentations/2007/MBPresentation.pdf
https://www.google.com/amp/s/beerandbrewing.com/amp/when-to-blend-your-beer/
https://www.homebrewersassociation.org/how-to-brew/the-art-of-blending-beer/

I like the way you are thinking.
This makes sense imho. Its much easyer to control the esters you want with yeast if they have their own non competing environment that you can control.
Also explains the smaller tanks spotted and if im not mistaken I read or heard somewhere thats what the Alchemist does as well to control the esters of conan which is only 1 yeast strain.
Now they got a state of art brewery and if they really have to resort to blending to get a stable ester profile out of 1 yeast how would Tree House be doing it with up to 3 yeasts?

 

[HopsAreGood]

IF they’re blending, can we assume that the amount of yeast being found in all of the analyses being done in this thread is similar to the blending ratios? Forgive me if this is a silly question as I recognize many of the posters here have far more knowledge than I.

I guess what I’m asking is would the final blended beer be about 90+% S-04 fermented beer, ~ 3% wb-06 fermented beer, and ~ 3% t-58 fermented beer?

 

[mcoman]

IF they’re blending, can we assume that the amount of yeast being found in all of the analyses being done in this thread is similar to the blending ratios? Forgive me if this is a silly question as I recognize many of the posters here have far more knowledge than I.

I guess what I’m asking is would the final blended beer be about 90+% S-04 fermented beer, ~ 3% wb-06 fermented beer, and ~ 3% t-58 fermented beer?

Not necessarily. Different yeasts will flocculate better than others, for example T-58, and S-04 will settle out more than wb-06 would. So you would get more wb-06 in an equal blend of the three. That would also depend on if the batches are filtered before blending. If @Clyde McCoy is seeing more S-04 in the can that the other two yeasts it could also mean that it is used for kräusen or some other late addition like packaging. It could also explain why T-58 could have taken over in the older can of very green, or it could be that that particular blend of very green was made with the bottom of the T-58 batch.

I'm still not convinced that they were blending the separately fermented batches back in their Brimfield brewery or even today. I guess its possible as I remember seeing kegs filled directly from their bright tank and thinking that the bright tank was rather large comped to the rest of their brewing equipment, so they could have just done the blending in the bright tank. I still think introducing a separate yeast during kräusen is more likely than a blend.

 

[Clyde McCoy]

Not necessarily. Different yeasts will flocculate better than others, for example T-58, and S-04 will settle out more than wb-06 would. So you would get more wb-06 in an equal blend of the three. That would also depend on if the batches are filtered before blending. If @Clyde McCoy is seeing more S-04 in the can that the other two yeasts it could also mean that it is used for kräusen or some other late addition like packaging. It could also explain why T-58 could have taken over in the older can of very green, or it could be that that particular blend of very green was made with the bottom of the T-58 batch.

I'm still not convinced that they were blending the separately fermented batches back in their Brimfield brewery or even today. I guess its possible as I remember seeing kegs filled directly from their bright tank and thinking that the bright tank was rather large comped to the rest of their brewing equipment, so they could have just done the blending in the bright tank. I still think introducing a separate yeast during kräusen is more likely than a blend.

I don't think they're blending batches. My best guess at this time is co-pitch with a very small amount (under 5% combined, possibly even less) of T-58 and WB-06 with S-04. The detected ratios will change depending on the age of the can at the time of analysis.

 

[NJGeorge]

I don't think they're blending batches. My best guess at this time is co-pitch with a very small amount (under 5% combined, possibly even less) of T-58 and WB-06 with S-04. The detected ratios will change depending on the age of the can at the time of analysis.

Are the tests you’re doing 100% accurate? Don’t some yeast look similar if not exactly like each other with their banding? Not trying to be a negative nance but I remember that in some past trials. I think everyone interested in this thread just needs to start experimenting to see for themselves. A lot of us on here in the past have tried those yeast at different pitching rates, temps, together/not together and no one has hit the nail on the head, yet. Yeah maybe some have gotten “close” with those yeasts pitched dry with no o2 but I beg to differ. Everyone at least has had a hint of clove and no TH beer ever has that. I’m very sensitive to it. What about WLP028 Scottish yeast? They mention melon esters in the description. I’m gonna give that a try. All I know is I get a lot of Isoamyl acetate in their house yeast beers. We should explore the yeast that produce that the most and how to accentuate it. Brew on!

 

[Clyde McCoy]

Are the tests you’re doing 100% accurate? Don’t some yeast look similar if not exactly like each other with their banding? Not trying to be a negative nance but I remember that in some past trials. I think everyone interested in this thread just needs to start experimenting to see for themselves. A lot of us on here in the past have tried those yeast at different pitching rates, temps, together/not together and no one has hit the nail on the head, yet. Yeah maybe some have gotten “close” with those yeasts pitched dry with no o2 but I beg to differ. Everyone at least has had a hint of clove and no TH beer ever has that. I’m very sensitive to it. What about WLP028 Scottish yeast? They mention melon esters in the description. I’m gonna give that a try. All I know is I get a lot of Isoamyl acetate in their house yeast beers. We should explore the yeast that produce that the most and how to accentuate it. Brew on!

Which strains do you have questions about? Yes, closely related strains should have a similar number/distribution of transposable elements.

@isomerization has tested a lot more strains than I have. You can see similarities across some of the strains he tested.