Can I use brewing yeast for bread?

[Nick Z]

None of the local stores have bread yeast. It, along with the flour, have been cleaned out of store shelves. I eventually found flour but bread yeast cannot be had for love or money.

However, I have plenty of brewing yeast on hand. Will that work for making bread? Using a packet of US-05 for each batch of bread would be prohibitively expensive so I was thinking of snagging some yeast from the yeast cake left over after a batch of beer is done. I thought I could propagate it in some sugar water. Will this work? Will the bread taste bizarre?

I had only one packet of bread yeast left and so I put it in a jar with sugar water to propagate it, just as I would make a starter with brewing yeast and malt extract. Whether I will be able to use this in bread or not, I don't know.

 

[day_trippr]

A cursory Google shows one can make all kinds of bread using brewers yeast.
For one example, check this out: https://pastrychefonline.com/baking-with-brewers-yeast/

In these apocalyptic times, the person with bags of malted grains, a Corona mill, and a yeast cake, could be royalty

Cheers!

 

[Nate R]

I had an expiring wheat yeast packet. I made a wheat bread with it in a bread machine. I fudgeg some ingtedients i was out of.
The yeast was fine. My substitutions sucked.

Its kinda a fun experiment.

 

[RM-MN]

Beer yeast is carefully cultivated to eat maltose. It really prefers to eat more simple sugar so using it in bread where table sugar or honey is the fermentable sugar should make it very happy.

 

[bracconiere]

a yeast cake, could be royalty

ahhh, royalty.....but back to the OP, as far as i know the only difference between ale yeast and bread yeast, is ale yeast flocculates in liquid, bread yeast doesn't....

i've made fine bread with my beer yeast cakes, but beer with bread yeast, i had to dump half my pours because they were cloudy/yeasty......

 

[bracconiere]

the person with bags of malted grains

or you could malt them yourself.....

 

[TurnipGreen]

If you have a little time you can use the dregs of a home brew as the yeast base for a sourdough starter.

I’ve made active starts in five days by dumping the last swig of a home brew in a starter. It won’t be quite as sour for a few more generations, but still makes a good loaf.

 

[Nick Z]

Thank you for the responses. I'll give it a whirl. I am concerned about the hop flavor coming through into the bread.

I have a few packets of Red Star wine yeast that I'm not planning to use anytime soon. And those packets are cheap. Could I simply use one of those? I was thinking about using a Premier Cuvee packet for bread. I'd probably rehydrate it and "proof" it first.

 

[lowtones84]

I've done it. It worked, but not as quickly as bread yeast for me. Rise times were quite a bit longer. Just my experience though, YMMV.

 

[Nate R]

Thank you for the responses. I'll give it a whirl. I am concerned about the hop flavor coming through into the bread.

I have a few packets of Red Star wine yeast that I'm not planning to use anytime soon. And those packets are cheap. Could I simply use one of those? I was thinking about using a Premier Cuvee packet for bread. I'd probably rehydrate it and "proof" it first.

Unless you are re-using yeast from a previously fermented beer (i.e. the yeast cake) you should not have any hop flavor at all. That would come from hops, not yeast.
I think a mildly hop flavoured bread would kick azz, but who knows.

Play around with it- flour and suagr is pretty cheap. Make up a 1 or 2 pound loaf, see what you think.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

Unless you are re-using yeast from a previously fermented beer (i.e. the yeast cake) you should not have any hop flavor at all. That would come from hops, not yeast.
I think a mildly hop flavoured bread would kick azz, but who knows.

Play around with it- flour and suagr is pretty cheap. Make up a 1 or 2 pound loaf, see what you think.

Yes, beer bread, though usually a quick bread is tasty. Yeast bread can get that flavor simply by subbing some water for beer.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

Webstaraunt.com has large brick of bakers yeast at a good price normally, but shipping isn’t cheap and they will only deliver to a biz address.

 

[Nick Z]

I could get a pound of bread yeast on Amazon but it's fifty bucks and I'll never use a pound of bread yeast. I'm making bread primarily out of boredom and to create treats for my parents (whom I live with).

But I also think it might be good to be able to make bread just in case we have to lock down completely and can't get groceries for a while.

At least I can keep my family supplied with beer.

 

[ba-brewer]

If you were to use yeast slurry instead of the dry yeast, any idea how much to use?

 

[Nick Z]

It seems to be working. I created a bread sponge after rehydrating some Premier Cuvee and Premier Classique in sugar water. The sponge did okay so I incorporated it into some French bread. The bread is rising, albeit very slowly. I'm not sure how warm to let the dough get lest I murder the yeast.

 

[TwistedGray]

It seems to be working. I created a bread sponge after rehydrating some Premier Cuvee and Premier Classique in sugar water. The sponge did okay so I incorporated it into some French bread. The bread is rising, albeit very slowly. I'm not sure how warm to let the dough get lest I murder the yeast.

Google what proving drawer temps are, and aim for that range. Also and/or alternatively, you should be able to find the temperature range of the yeast via Google.

 

[Nick Z]

It is rising so slowly I've decided to let it rise/rest overnight. Then shape it into a loaf and do the final rise in the morning.

I have some hopes I can propagate the last envelope of bread yeast and use that until the stores re-stock with yeast.

Funny how you take the availability of certain goods for granted. I didn't bother to monitor how much baking powder I had left because I could just zip down to the store and snag some. Not so anymore.

 

[Gadjobrinus]

FWIW, in terms of long ferments, I've done as long as 18 hour bulk ferments to date. 1% sourdough levain inoculation and cool room temps. It's an approach you'll find here and there, the French call it fermentation lente, though that can also apply to simply retarding (this is different).

I love low and slow ferments for the depth of flavors this brings. If it's going, no matter how slow, I'd say, you might be golden in discovering another method for yourself.

 

[Jag75]

Do you guys also make flour out of your spent grain?

 

[Nick Z]

Hurrah! I found some bread yeast at the store. I am still going to try propagating some of the bread yeast. I tried with a "rapid rise" (instant) yeast and it didn't seem to work very well. I think I may have hit the yeast's alcohol tolerance and killed it. I'm going to try again with an envelope of the regular bread yeast.

What I was doing was 1 cup of water and 1/2 a cup of sugar. With some DAP and yeast energizer thrown in.

 

[TwistedGray]

Do you guys also make flour out of your spent grain?

You can use a small percentage of spent grain @Hoppy2bmerry has made a few loafs with spent grain, if I'm not mistaken.

 

[HockeyBoy29]

Do you guys also make flour out of your spent grain?

 

[Jag75]

That's cool !

 

[Nate R]

Any adjustments for loss of sugar, etc.?

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

If you were to use yeast slurry instead of the dry yeast, any idea how much to use?

Yo can, but activity (amount of time it will take dough to proof) will depend on how many viable cells are in the slurry. I would guess 2 tsp for a batch of dough would work.

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

I do not, dry and mill spent grain, I add it moist to the dough mixture. Perhaps if I had a grain mill for making flour I would. It would certainly take up less space that way.

 

[Stand]

I have been meaning to dry some spending grain and throw it in the food processor. Next go round.

 

[norstar]

I did this yesterday and it was a great success. My first time making bread too.

I had four small jam jars full of washed yeast from the last cake. I used two which came up at about 150g.

I made a starter by pouring this yeast into a small bowl with a heaped teaspoon of sugar and plain flour to match the weight. Made a thick "goop" which started bubbling like mad and doubling in size after an hour. I panicked and started to make the bread immediately as a result.

Mixed with 620g tepid water, added 16g salt and 1150g ordinary plain flour and mixed.

Leave half an hour to absorb water.

Then sprayed surface and hands with atomizer gun, turned out and folded about 10-20 times on top of itself.

Left to prove covered at room temp 2 hours. Noticeable increase in size!

Folded another few times. And proved again 2 hours. Again, growing!

Had a few problems with it being sticky so had to add more flour onto surface to dry it out a bit to work with - but I think that's me being not very good.

Final stretch into long piece, then rolled bit by bit and crimped on last edge.

Prove uncovered in fridge overnight (grows a skin which helps putting a slit into it when baking), turn out onto baking paper lined tray or buttered/floured loaf tin with cut in top surface, and bake 15 mins at 230 degrees C then 20 at 190, with a tray of boiling water at bottom of oven.

Turned out like the pics - I'm well pleased. No hops/yeast flavour at all.

From what I've read, you need to give it time to prove compared to normal bread yeast, and be careful not to knock the air out when you work it.

I see no reason why dried yeast wouldn't work if you rehydrated it first and made a starter in the same way.

I did two - one "loose" on a baking tray to make it rustic like, and another in a loaf tin.

 

[Beernik]

It looks good.

If you wanted, long term, you could make a stiff levain from one of the slurries. Then you would just separate & feed it like you would a stiff sourdough starter.

 

[stickyfinger]

i used a yeast cake from a brew once. it made a bitter unpleasant dense bread. that was 20 yrs ago though. be careful getting bread yeast on amazon these days. lots of crap expired yeast being sold.