dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Was gonna give it a try today for kicks since I have a bottle lying around and it looks unfiltered - I know most of their bombers are. Anyone had any experience with this yeast?
Anybody tried culturing the Beard Beer yeast from Rogue?
- Thread starter dangerbrew
- Start date
Help Support Homebrew Talk - Beer, Wine, Mead, & Cider Brewing Discussion Forum:
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Well, I went ahead and made a starter for it around 150 mL of 1.017 wort from light pilsner DME. Poured it into the room temperature bottle with the bottom layer of beer present and swirled it and tossed an airlock on it. Set it right near my thermostat which is set at 69F. I'll keep you all updated on how it turns out. I'm really hoping I start to see some minor signs of fermentation in the next few days. It didn't look like there was a whole lot of yeast in the bottle, but hopefully there was enough... The last few pours from it into the glass were pretty cloudy at least so I'm crossing fingers on this one. If it doesn't start, no big loss, but I really do like the yeast strain. Almost belgian-like.
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Alright, some good news! It's the full second day of the starter culture sitting at 69F and I'm seeing a good amount of sediment ringing around the bottom and also a little bit of foaming on top of the starter wort! The airlock is also pushed up a bit so it looks like I may have some usable Beard Beer yeast on the way soon!! 
As far as I know, after searching around on the interweb for quite a while, it looks like I'm the first one to ever attempt culturing this yeast. Makes me feel like the Neil Armstrong of Beard Beer...
As far as I know, after searching around on the interweb for quite a while, it looks like I'm the first one to ever attempt culturing this yeast. Makes me feel like the Neil Armstrong of Beard Beer...
dangerbrew said:Alright, some good news! It's the full second day of the starter culture sitting at 69F and I'm seeing a good amount of sediment ringing around the bottom and also a little bit of foaming on top of the starter wort! The airlock is also pushed up a bit so it looks like I may have some usable Beard Beer yeast on the way soon!!
As far as I know, after searching around on the interweb for quite a while, it looks like I'm the first one to ever attempt culturing this yeast. Makes me feel like the Neil Armstrong of Beard Beer...
Well technically you would be the second
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Well technically you would be the second
Yeah... Darn - when you're right, you're right. :cross: Another chance at personal glory foiled once again.
Unfortunately I don't have a local supply of John Maier beard lying around to harvest the original strain from. Maybe I should have just tried dipping my own beard into the starter and see what would happen?
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
It's Day 3 of the Beard Beer yeast experiment and there's a healthy amount of foam on the surface of the starter and a good chunk of sediment on the bottom of the container - this stuff works quickly! Some minor airlock activity and it smells good, just like the original beer itself. Tonight I'm going to pour some of the liquid off and let it sit in the fridge overnight and taste it in the morning. If it tastes good enough, I'm gonna move forward and step this puppy up to a 1500 mL starter and from there pitch it onto a Black IPA batch I'm planning, tentatively called "Project Blackbeerd."
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Day 4 update. Tasted the sample that I decanted out yesterday evening. It tasted like Beard Beer for sure! Very interesting belgian-ish profile, hard to describe. At that point I decided to go ahead and make the step-up starter to 1500 mL. Cooled the wort (with an addition of 1/4 tsp. Wyeast nutrient) down to 70 and pitched the culture on it after a good amount of swirling.
Checked it this morning and WOW! This stuff takes off quick! Big layer of foam on top, thick layer of sediment, and the airlock is bubbling about every 2 seconds. Smells amazing as well! Getting ingredients together to brew "Project Blackbeer'd" this weekend with my fiancee. She's an even bigger Black IPA fan than I am, which is saying a lot, but I'm letting her take the creative reins on this recipe and see how it turns out.
In any case, it's official: It doesn't say "unfiltered" and there's hardly any sediment to speak of when you first look at the bottle, but you can absolutely culture Rogue's Beard Beer yeast from the bottle. Hope this helps anyone else who's interested in trying. I will post pics and tasting notes of the future beer once it's finished.
Cheers, mates!
Checked it this morning and WOW! This stuff takes off quick! Big layer of foam on top, thick layer of sediment, and the airlock is bubbling about every 2 seconds. Smells amazing as well! Getting ingredients together to brew "Project Blackbeer'd" this weekend with my fiancee. She's an even bigger Black IPA fan than I am, which is saying a lot, but I'm letting her take the creative reins on this recipe and see how it turns out.
In any case, it's official: It doesn't say "unfiltered" and there's hardly any sediment to speak of when you first look at the bottle, but you can absolutely culture Rogue's Beard Beer yeast from the bottle. Hope this helps anyone else who's interested in trying. I will post pics and tasting notes of the future beer once it's finished.
Cheers, mates!
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Update! We are on day 3 of primary fermentation for the Project Blackbeer'd Black IPA on the Beard Beer yeast and it is going strong. I pitched the yeast on Monday at about 71 F around 7:30 PM and by 11:00 PM I could already see airlock activity. Brought it down to the basement after that and as of this time it's still bubbling actively at 66 F. Smells great. Kind of a bready, tart-fruitish aroma with slight Belgian notes, and of course the hop aroma is present as well. I'll have pics to post later once it finishes up. Extremely excited to try this one.
Here's my recipe, for all those interested. Kind of a mish-mash (pun intended) of a bunch of ingredients I've had lying around for a while.
Project Blackbeerd - Beard Beer Black IPA
ibu 72.47
srm 60.6
abv 6.7%
5.25 gallons
10 lbs Pale 2-Row US
0.5 lbs Crystal 60 L
0.5 lbs Honey Malt
0.5 lbs Munich Malt
0.5 lbs Victory Malt
1 lbs Carafoam
1 lbs Torrified Wheat
0.5 lbs Carafa III Special (added in last 20 min of mash)
0.5 lbs Chocolate Malt (added in last 20 min of mash)
0.25 lbs Special Roast
1 oz Columbus (60 min)
1 oz Cascade (10 min)
½ tsp Wyeast Yeast Nutrient (10 min)
1 oz Cluster (5 min)
1 oz. Centennial and Amarillo (1 min)
1 oz. Mt. Hood (Dry Hop 7 days)
Mashed 4 gallons @ 156F for 60 min
1500 mL starter of Beard Beer yeast culture from Rogue
Cheers!
Here's my recipe, for all those interested. Kind of a mish-mash (pun intended) of a bunch of ingredients I've had lying around for a while.
Project Blackbeerd - Beard Beer Black IPA
ibu 72.47
srm 60.6
abv 6.7%
5.25 gallons
10 lbs Pale 2-Row US
0.5 lbs Crystal 60 L
0.5 lbs Honey Malt
0.5 lbs Munich Malt
0.5 lbs Victory Malt
1 lbs Carafoam
1 lbs Torrified Wheat
0.5 lbs Carafa III Special (added in last 20 min of mash)
0.5 lbs Chocolate Malt (added in last 20 min of mash)
0.25 lbs Special Roast
1 oz Columbus (60 min)
1 oz Cascade (10 min)
½ tsp Wyeast Yeast Nutrient (10 min)
1 oz Cluster (5 min)
1 oz. Centennial and Amarillo (1 min)
1 oz. Mt. Hood (Dry Hop 7 days)
Mashed 4 gallons @ 156F for 60 min
1500 mL starter of Beard Beer yeast culture from Rogue
Cheers!
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Good luck with the beer... I hope it doesn't taste like cigarettes and pizza
How did you guess the secret ingredients?!
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
So I emailed Rogue just to get their insight on the beard yeast and fermentation temperature, etc. - they replied back and I thought I'd just go ahead and post this for anyone else that's interested in culturing this strain:
"Hi Joshua, thanks for writing! I asked John and he said to go 70-75 F on it. Best of luck, let us know how it turns out. It's a very fickle yeast and hard to work with - what style of beer are you going to make with it? We went with a Belgiany-golden style to try to get the pure taste of the yeast to show through.
Hoppy Holidays!
Cheers!
Stacey Maier
Rogue Nation World Headquarters
Newport, OR"
Yeah, Rogue's pretty awesome. I'm going to email them the results once it finishes up. One more week in primary then it's going to the keg. Smells awesome. Been sitting at 68 F for about 5 days now but was up around 70-72 for the first 2 days of fermentation.
"Hi Joshua, thanks for writing! I asked John and he said to go 70-75 F on it. Best of luck, let us know how it turns out. It's a very fickle yeast and hard to work with - what style of beer are you going to make with it? We went with a Belgiany-golden style to try to get the pure taste of the yeast to show through.
Hoppy Holidays!
Cheers!
Stacey Maier
Rogue Nation World Headquarters
Newport, OR"
Yeah, Rogue's pretty awesome. I'm going to email them the results once it finishes up. One more week in primary then it's going to the keg. Smells awesome. Been sitting at 68 F for about 5 days now but was up around 70-72 for the first 2 days of fermentation.
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Alright, so here are the results of Project Blackbeer'd:
It's a nice dark beer, verging on a Robust Porter with some dark chocolate notes in the background and a nice aroma/flavor combination of English/citrusy hops. The yeast character from the Beard Beer yeast is only slightly noticeable, but this was to be expected. Still, it's an interesting little twist on an already interesting beer.
However, the biggest surprise was this - the Special Roast malt I added that I got fresh from a pro-brewer friend of mine. I'd never used it before and thought I'd give it a shot. On Briess's website it says "5-10% Excellent in IPA, ESB, Amber, Nut Brown Ale, Porter and other dark beer styles."
I used only 1/4 lb of the stuff - about 1.64% of the total grist, much less than they suggested - and holy hockeysticks... that stuff is STRONG. I'm talking like this beer has taken on such a strong toasty, sourdough, tangy characteristic that it almost tastes like the crust from a dark sourdough bread. It's definitely a flavor I've never encountered in a beer before and not an unwelcome one by any means, but I think I'm going to let this one mellow for a while as John Palmer suggests when using Brown malt or Special Roast malt. Maybe for 3 or 4 months:
"My Santa Nevada Porter, an all-grain recipe listed at the end of the Porter section, uses brown malt and does indeed benefit from 4 months of conditioning time. What starts out as harshly bitter-malt beer turns into a sweeter, smooth elixir." -- How to Brew, Chapter 19
In terms of the Beard Beer yeast, I guess I didn't expect it to come through very much with all of the other strong flavors in this beer, but I did harvest it and will be using it in some future batches - lighter beers for sure, both in color and character - to bring out the full yeast profile.
It's a nice dark beer, verging on a Robust Porter with some dark chocolate notes in the background and a nice aroma/flavor combination of English/citrusy hops. The yeast character from the Beard Beer yeast is only slightly noticeable, but this was to be expected. Still, it's an interesting little twist on an already interesting beer.
However, the biggest surprise was this - the Special Roast malt I added that I got fresh from a pro-brewer friend of mine. I'd never used it before and thought I'd give it a shot. On Briess's website it says "5-10% Excellent in IPA, ESB, Amber, Nut Brown Ale, Porter and other dark beer styles."
I used only 1/4 lb of the stuff - about 1.64% of the total grist, much less than they suggested - and holy hockeysticks... that stuff is STRONG. I'm talking like this beer has taken on such a strong toasty, sourdough, tangy characteristic that it almost tastes like the crust from a dark sourdough bread. It's definitely a flavor I've never encountered in a beer before and not an unwelcome one by any means, but I think I'm going to let this one mellow for a while as John Palmer suggests when using Brown malt or Special Roast malt. Maybe for 3 or 4 months:
"My Santa Nevada Porter, an all-grain recipe listed at the end of the Porter section, uses brown malt and does indeed benefit from 4 months of conditioning time. What starts out as harshly bitter-malt beer turns into a sweeter, smooth elixir." -- How to Brew, Chapter 19
In terms of the Beard Beer yeast, I guess I didn't expect it to come through very much with all of the other strong flavors in this beer, but I did harvest it and will be using it in some future batches - lighter beers for sure, both in color and character - to bring out the full yeast profile.
rorypayne
Well-Known Member
Excellent thread, did they happen to say what the strain would compare to or the origins?
OP
OP
dangerbrew
Well-Known Member
Not really. It's partially a wild strain but I imagine it must have started out as Pacman once upon a time since it was harvested from John Maier's beard and that's their house yeast that's probably floating around everywhere in the brewery. Anyway, it probably found some way to mingle with some wild yeast in the local environment and has now taken on somewhat of a "Belgian-like" characteristic that is slightly spicy and kind of bready as well. It's a really neat strain. I've never used anything like it before.
You should try the Beard Beer and see what you think.
Belgian golden, a little spicy and wheat beer-ish if you ask me. Saw John at a festival at Rogue and he didn't give any indication what he thought it was.
rorypayne
Well-Known Member
Definitely going to try it. I am going to a craft beer and wine store tomorrow to pick up some stuff, I'm going to see if they have it.
