Addition of Second Yeast

[scorpionsix]

Hello Group,

I was at my local brew store and was talking to the owner about how I was in the process of brewing a Storm the Bastille Imperial Farmhouse Ale from Northern Brewer. The owner indicated that with Trappist/Belgian Ale's, some people like to add different yeast strands in a secondary to create different flavors.

In thinking about this more and doing some searching on the internet, adding more yeast to the secondary after the beer has fermented past the first two weeks doesn't sound like a good thing. This is primarily because I am under the impression that the Yeast consumes the majority of sugar in the first few weeks of Fermentation.

With this being said, I wanted to ask the group if anyone has added yeast after the Fermentation has completed. I am curious if this is a common practice or something that should be avoided.

I am still quite new to home brewing and still trying to wrap my head around yeast production and the different types of strands.

Thanks in advance!

 

[solbes]

I have brewed 8 or 9 Belgian batches and never repitched additional yeast. I don't see how pitching additional yeast in secondary would do anything, unless you had a batch that was a stuck ferment (didn't get down to acceptable finished gravity).

Sometimes Belgian brewers will filter out their primary yeast and bottle condition with a different strain so that their primary yeast cannot be sourced. Additionally homebrewers will sometimes pitch more yeast when their beer has sat in secondary for a long time, or undergone a very cold conditioning phase (31-33F). The yeast that is left might be too stressed out to ferment the extra priming sugar, so a little bit of yeast is added at bottling.

In summary, I would not pitch more yeast in secondary, and I don't see how adding a second strain would help either. Cheers

 

[slarkin712]

I agree with solbes. There is one other technique for adding a secondary yeast that makes sense. Adding Brettanomyces after the primary fermentation has been performed by a standard saccharomyces strain will add some interesting and unique flavors that cannot be achieved with saccharomyces alone. This requires extended aging of the beer to produce the "Brett" flavors, anywhere from 3 months to a year or longer. Perhaps that is what the shop owner was insinuating.

 

[ibrewmyown]

Sometimes Belgian brewers will filter out their primary yeast and bottle condition with a different strain so that their primary yeast cannot be sourced. Additionally homebrewers will sometimes pitch more yeast when their beer has sat in secondary for a long time, or undergone a very cold conditioning phase (31-33F). The yeast that is left might be too stressed out to ferment the extra priming sugar, so a little bit of yeast is added at bottling.

In summary, I would not pitch more yeast in secondary, and I don't see how adding a second strain would help either. Cheers

+1 There are very few Belgian beers that I can recall that use their proprietary yeast when bottling. I've re-cultured yeast from the dregs of Westmalle with very good results with regards to flavor, etc. but I couldn't tell you if its the yeast they use to ferment their beer. I actually had brewed 10 gallons and had about a gallon in a keg for years. About 2 years ago, I wanted to move things around and I had completely forgotten about this beer. There was only about 2 liters left so I sanitized a 2L bottle, put a Co2 pressure cap on it and stuck it down in my keezer to be forgotten about again. I few weeks ago I tasted it with a couple friends and its one of the smoothest best tasting beers that I've ever tasted and its 10 YEARS OLD! Its far from the 24 year old Chimay I had in Belgium but it goes to show those strong Belgians last a LONG time. I may have to make another batch for my 60th birthday.....

 

[adamdillabo]

http://www.whitelabs.com/yeast/wlp565-belgian-saison-i-yeast

This made me think of the note to Brewers in the link.

 

[scorpionsix]

That's exactly what I came across and got me thinking. In reading the responses from everyone and reading up on Yeast a little more, it sounds like adding more yeast runs the risk spoiling the beer or at minimum producing unwanted/undesired tastes.

 

[Bobcatbrewing42]

I've wondered about adding a second yeast at times to kick a stuck ferment into gear or to supplement some save yeast and solve a problem to save a long drive to the LHBS.
My only experience with second yeasts were wild contaminants that can ferment sugars that the primary yeast didn't. I've had a few bottles with "gusher yeast" and it wasn't pretty. I also had a carboy get a wild yeast infection (my expert friend's opinion) that made the beer taste "phenolic." It was the prettiest, clearest batch ever. Most of it got poured out.

 

[ibrewmyown]

Unless the type of beer you're making requires a "finishing" yeast to make it drier like some Saison, I can't see any advantage besides maybe experimenting. Adding yeast to a stuck fermentation usually takes a LOT of fresh yeast because there's already alcohol formed so using a normal dose of yeast will likely not start very well or finish. If your fermentation started quickly but just didn't finish, making sure things are sanitized and pitching a LOT of fresh yeast (same strain) should kick a stuck fermentation without any issues assuming there wasn't an issue with wild yeast or bacteria before then.