Blending yeasts

[erockomania]

Has anyone here ever experimented with doing yeast blends? If so, what was your process and outcome?

 

[TyTanium]

A lot of folks split the batch, ferment separately, then blend post fermentation. If they're fermented together, one strain may out-compete the other. But if they're similar strains - like 2 Belgians - you can usually combine without issue and get characteristics of both.

 

[Warthaug]

Like Ty said, if you mix two strains it is not uncommon for one to out-compete the other, leading to a beer little different than one brewed with the "winner". The other issue is that you end up with little control over how much of each yeasts profile you end up with. If you desire a mix, blending is the way to go.

Bryan

 

[erockomania]

Seeing and using the WL Saison Yeast blend led to this question. Out of curiosity, how would a home-brewer go about blending after fermentation?

 

[TyTanium]

The WL blends are typically of a similar strain, which is why those work - don't have to worry about out-competing too much.

For blending, just rack like you normally would to a bottling bucket or secondary, doing whatever proportion of each you desire.

 

[beergolf]

I have done it. I did a tripel using 1214 and 3787. You could taste both ,but the 3787 was a little more prominent. Since 1214 usually is a little slower to start if I did it again i would pitch the 1214 about 6 hours sooner than the 3787. It was a good brew however.

 

[ReverseApacheMaster]

Seeing and using the WL Saison Yeast blend led to this question. Out of curiosity, how would a home-brewer go about blending after fermentation?

Right in the bottling bucket. Make sure you give it slow stirring to ensure you get a good blend. Or syphon intermittently to mix.

Have a good idea of what you want the beer to taste like. E.g. if one strain is very peppery and one is very fruity then you need to have an idea of how much of each quality you want in the final beer. Similarly, some strains have different fruit flavors and you need to think about what you want that final beer to taste like. You might need to do some experimenting blending in a glass and sampling it until you get to where you want to be. You could just dump all of each one in the bucket and hope a 50/50 split tastes good but you might be missing a superior beer and you're missing out on the experience to learn to be a blender.

 

[erockomania]

Very interesting. I definitely want to try this at some point.

Thanks guys!

 

[FL_ABG_brewer77]

I'm actually thinking about brewing 20 gals of imperial stout, and fermenting 10 gal of each with two different strains. Then when I keg the beer, I'll end up with 5 gals of strain #1, 5 gals of strain #2 that i'll just put on tap, and the remaining 10 gals i'll blend together.

 

[monkeymath]

One small caveat to keep in mind when mixing separately fermented beers at bottling: the two yeast strains should have comparable attenuation, else it might result in overcarbonation.

The differences in attenuation are usually rather overstated among homebrewers, but there are a few poor attenuators (such as Gozdawa OGA9) and a few super attenuators (such as Wyeast 3711). So don't mix those two!

 

[yeastseeker]

I have blended a simonaitis and raftevold kveik isolates. The simonaitis isolate had a wonderful orange flavor but was prone to stalling and wasnt very flocculant. I added a isolate from the raftevold culture that was attenuative, flocculant and neutral. It worked out well. Still get teh simonaitis orange flavor but it doesnt stall and floccs better.