Yes...it is!
In general, the degree of dryness is more a function of the yeast strain and it's alcohol tolerance rather than the pitching rate. As previously suggested, it's far easier to underpitch (which can lead to sluggish/unhealthy fermentation and higher chance of off flavors) than overpitch.
My rant wasn't supposed to sound like a rant, more of "shoulder shrugging exasperation". Only because there's lots of info out there that's been posted by people who figured that a 5 gramme pack could be split into 5 x 1 gramme. to try 5 x 1 gallon batches or just save some etc etc.
It's just a little frustrating, as the only potential way of doing this would be to make something like a large starter, then splitting it when you're satisfied that it's fermenting well and evenly mixed.
From some stuff I was reading a while back, there's been some work done and published about "over pitching", which it seems, would be impossible. Because all you might be doing would be adding enough active yeast cells for the ferment to be completed as fast as is "chemically" (might be the wrong word, maybe biologically would be better, not sure) possible.
Didn't really take much notice as I can't really recall the size of batch, but the basics of the result was that to be beneficial, in a 5 or maybe 10 gallon batch, to "pitch high", you'd be talking using something daft like 20 or 30 sachets of yeast, not just 3 or 4.
Plus the very nature of the packaging that the yeast comes in, irrespective of whether it's dried or liquid, most packs of "home brew" size, are designed as a 1 hit pack for "UP TO" 5 gallons (again some debate, as whether they mean 5 imp gallons or 5 US gallons - I use imp gallons and never had any excessive lag under normal circumstances).
As I mentioned, as soon as the pack is opened, the pack environment is contaminated/violated, which is why it's basically a pointless exercise trying to stretch a yeast like that.
Of course, you could always make a large starter, and if you have the appropriate control conditions to keep it running Ok, pitch part of that and then feed the rest of the starter to keep the colony going.
In practice, it's cheap enough just to pitch the whole pack, because as biochemedic points out, it's not about how much yeast, it's about the type of yeast that dictate what's gonna happen during fermentation. Unless you're deliberately gonna stress a yeast to learn from what the difference of a good/smooth fermentation and poor/bad/stressed fermentation come out like......
Either way, sorry if it sounded like a flame/rant/criticism, it wasn't supposed to sound like that (see above).
regards
fatbloke
