Help me choose a yeast for my IIPA

I am brewing an Avery Maharaja clone this weekend (OG = 1.089). The recipe recommends White Labs San Diergo Super Yeast, a yeast which I love but don't have access to right now.

I have the following yeasts available: Wyeast Pacman; Wyeast Greenbelt; WLP250 (American Pub Ale); WLP 299 (Persica Ale); and BRY 97 (American West Coast Ale Yeast). I don't have any experience with any of these strains, except Pacman. From what I've read, I'm leaning towards Pacman or WLP250, but would appreciate any suggestions from those of you in the know.

Thanks.

 

I don't know about those yeasts. I'd use dry S-05, which you really should have on hand anyway.

The super yeast is a great attenuator, and perfect for a IIPA. Since you can't use that, consider replacing 10% (or more) of the base malt with table sugar to help get the beer down to a more drinkable FG. If you're not careful, that beer might end up in the high 1.020's and be too thick for an IPA.

 

I could use S-05, but I would like to use one of the liquid yeasts if possible as they are starting to get old. Also, I am adding a pound of dextrose to dry it out. The FG should be around 1.016. Here is the grain bill:

11.4 lbs 2-Row
.8 lbs Crystal 60L
.4 lbs Victory
1 lb Dextrose

 

Dextrose will work great. FYI, there is not difference between dextrose and table sugar (sucrose) in fermentation. The result after the yeast consume them is exactly the same. I'd guess that the dextrose might prime a bit more quickly if you bottle with it, so maybe save the dextrose for that? (I always used table sugar for bottling too, which does work fine).

 

If pitching rates are equal (which means some seriously massive starters OR the appropriate amount of healthy viable slurry from a previous batch) then I'd go with Pacman. But... If you can't produce a liquid pitch of the right amount, I'd go with two packets of that bry-97, which although might be a slight over pitch, I'd much rather over pitch than under pitch such a big beer.

I feel like a hall monitor harping on about pitch rates, but in my experience, more dry yeast will always trump less of a liquid pitch. Ymmv.

 

I'd vote for pacman, wish I could lay hands on some up here, haven't been able to get any in years.

 

maybe pitch on a "small beer" yeast cake?

 

If you can't get SD Super, I'd learn towards Pacman for sure.. I find it to be both a very clean and a very quickly fermenting yeast that flocs quite well and has good attenuation and can handle up to 10-11% ABV. These days if it's an IPA or a pale ale I'm mostly using Pacman as I find it nice with a dry crispness to it.

I've had a 1.071 IPA with Pacman come to final gravity faster than a 1.060 Pale ale with 1056 at the same temperature.

 

I was going to brew this as well and the recipe that is listed on their site just says "Yeast: California" so I bought WLP-001 and just pitched it into a starter an hour ago. Where did you see something call for this instead?

Looking online it sounds like they are similar, except for speed and flocculation. There shouldn't be a problem pitching a 1.5L starter (decanted and added 1.5L a second time) to get Maharaja done, right? Yeast calc is giving me 480B total with only 336B needed (I wanted a bit extra to freeze).

 

I brewed an IIPA earlier this year with WLP001 and it came out great; no attenuation issues.