Used a Wit yeast for anything else?

[mrkristofo]

Hey hey hey. So I have a primary with a nice 3944 cake, and so I was curious if anyone's used a belgian wit yeast for anything other than a wit? Flavor profiles offered by WYeast and White Labs are pretty vague: Slightly phenolic and tart, this is the flavor in belgian wit. Great....I knew that.

I was thinking about brewing something without wheat, maybe brew up the wort for a kölsch and pitch it on to the cake. Sound tasty? Sound awful? Brew a Geueze?

Cheers.

 

[RoaringBrewer]

You don't need to pitch on the cake, obviously... Why not just harvest and wash some of the yeast for use at a later date?

You might be able to pitch some sort of Belgian onto it that has phenolic flavors - but if I were going to do a belgian pale, dubbel, trippel - there are better yeast choices (Abbey Ale, Trappist Ale, etc).

Same for Kolsch - you could give it a shot, but there are better yeast choices, e.g. Kolsch ale yeast...

This is the very reason that liquid yeasts are both excellent at times (brewing authentic styles you can't brew with normal, neutral yeasts) and less desirable at others (they are by definition specialized yeasts) like your situation now. You'd not have to ask this question if you had a cake of S-05 or Nottingham in your fermenter...

I say brew another Wit or harvest for later use... unless you are up for experimentation.

Also, don't take the S-05/Nottingham comment the wrong way. It's meant to be a retorical question, not an insult. I just recently started using more liquid yeasts and I love it! However, I *do* try to plan my brews (at least 2-3) out so that I can pitch on the cake from the liquid yeast at least once if not twice before harvesting (or sometimes I won't even harvest - $6 for a vial / 3 batches = $2 a batch or the same as dry)...

 

[mrkristofo]

Yeah, I'd planned on harvesting/washing/culturing/storing it, but for convenience's sake I thought I'd see if there was something else. When I was referring to the Kölsch, I simply meant a light in color, slightly malty, low-gravity type wort that might benefit from the inherent flavors of the wit yeast. I just didn't know what those inherent flavors were. I was thinking it might come out like a belgian blonde, but you're right, there's numerous other strains better suited for that.

Maybe I'll see what kind of second/third runnings I can pull off this IIPA I brew today, and I'll throw it on there. If it tastes like sh*t, no harm done then. If it works out, then we all learned something .

Cheers for the reply.

 

[RoaringBrewer]

Not a problem man, if you are up for experimentation, no drawback to pitching on the cake...

I'm sure there are some things that are reasonable to pitch on that cake - I just didn't know of any off the top of my head!

I would assume the flavors from the wit yeast are fairly subtle. They come through in a lightly hopped, low malt wit-bier, but you may even be able to mask/hide them by pitching a heavier - either darker, or hoppier, or whatever - onto the cake. You might develop something interesting.

Let us know what you pitch on there and how it turns out!

 

[count barleywine]

how bout a saison? Mod your recipe for a dryer finish, plus hoppier I believe. Look for some saison recipes online Ommegang's Hennepin is a great commercial saison and one of my favorite beers right now.

 

[Bert]

I've got a Belgian Pale in the primary right now that I used WLP400 for. It's mostly experimental but I'm sure however it turns out it will be quite drinkable. I'll try to remember to update this thread in a month when it's ready for sampling.

Pretty basic recipe... 7.5 lbs pale, 2 lbs Munich, 1 lb 40l crystal. NZ Hallertauer bittering, Sterling finishing. 26.5 IBU.

 

[RoaringBrewer]

I've got a Belgian Pale in the primary right now that I used WLP400 for. It's mostly experimental but I'm sure however it turns out it will be quite drinkable. I'll try to remember to update this thread in a month when it's ready for sampling.

Pretty basic recipe... 7.5 lbs pale, 2 lbs Munich, 1 lb 40l crystal. NZ Hallertauer bittering, Sterling finishing. 26.5 IBU.

I'd definitely be interested to hear how this turns out...

I just recently brewed a Belgian Pale recipe also (6lb belgian pils, 2lb dark [20L] munich, 1lb vienna, hallarteau bittering/finishing, 25.8IBU), very similar to your own. However, I used the White Labs Abbey Ale (#530)...

 

[denimglen]

I think I read on here that someone made apfelwein with a wit yeast or hefe maybe? And it came out quite good.

 

[Kai]

You've got a lot of it if it's a yeastcake - make an imperial Wit. Unibroue makes a fantastic beer, it might be Don de Dieu, which is a big Wit grain bill with a little bit of candi sugar and it comes out around 8.5%. Imperial Wit, Tripel Wit, whatever you want to call it.

 

[Bert]

I'd definitely be interested to hear how this turns out...

I just recently brewed a Belgian Pale recipe also (6lb belgian pils, 2lb dark [20L] munich, 1lb vienna, hallarteau bittering/finishing, 25.8IBU), very similar to your own. However, I used the White Labs Abbey Ale (#530)...

I finally tasted the first bottle of my Belgian Pale last night and I really liked it. It was largely as I had imagined it... fairly light with low bitterness but with the nice fruity charactoristics of the WLP400. Very drinkable and a nice summer beer. Clarity isn't great but I didn't expect it to be... despite reracking once and leaving it in the third-ary for over a month. I definitely plan on making it again and plan on using the 400 as my primary yeast for Belgians of most any variety.