Side by Side Yeast Experiments

[estricklin]

I've been doing a lot of 10 gallon batches lately, splitting my wort into 2 separate fermenters. I've decided that as often as possible, I'm going to pitch 2 different yeasts. I've done a few in the past, but did not take notes or share my results unfortunately.

As of now I have a Blueberry Ale that is finished, 1 half is with 05 and the other with Irish Ale. The Irish Ale was bottled a few days ago and the 05 kegged, so I won't be able to do formal tasting for a few more days on those.

I have in primary a Shiner Ruby Redbird Clone, half pitched with S-23 and half with 34/70.

I plan to do a lot of experimenting with yeast strains and American Lite Lager, and really lager yeast in general. Of coarse I am planning to do plenty of ales too, but lagers are sort of my passion. I will share the full recipes and fermentation schedules also.

If anyone is interested, just keep checking in and I'll try to do the most honest, and fair comparisons to my ability, and share that information with HBT.

Cheers!
Eric

 

[electric_beer]

Sounds like a great idea! Interested in your notes.

 

[Calder]

Do you find you get much difference?

I recently split 11 gallons of brown ale 4 ways, and can hardly tell the difference (I was using the small batches as starters for larger beers). Maybe brown ale is the wrong type of beer to use.

I used PacMan and Thames II, both fermented in the low 60s, and Chimay and Brett-C fermented low 70s (started at 68, and finished at 75 F).

I was surprised the Chimay didn't stand out. It was slightly fruitier, but if you were not looking for a difference, you wouldn't notice it.

Interested to see your experiences. Please provide fermentation temp info too.

 

[estricklin]

Do you find you get much difference?

I recently split 11 gallons of brown ale 4 ways, and can hardly tell the difference (I was using the small batches as starters for larger beers). Maybe brown ale is the wrong type of beer to use.

I used PacMan and Thames II, both fermented in the low 60s, and Chimay and Brett-C fermented low 70s (started at 68, and finished at 75 F).

I was surprised the Chimay didn't stand out. It was slightly fruitier, but if you were not looking for a difference, you wouldn't notice it.

Interested to see your experiences. Please provide fermentation temp info too.

Surely the Brett stood out some?

I would say that some have surprised more than others, but as I mentioned my data so far isn't very formal, and honestly can't remember some of it. I split a Saison 2 ways, one with Belle and the other with some type of neutral ale that I can't remember. Was interesting because I found that the noble hops stood out and gave more of a spicy character than I thought they did. Some others have been pumpkin lagers, oatmeal stout, Irish Red and some pale ales. I should have kept tasting notes!

I will definitely give temperatures, and pitching rates also.

 

[Calder]

Surely the Brett stood out some?

Nope, got squat out of the Brett. Was a pretty clean yeast.

This was a 'starter' for a bigger beer. Ran the Brett in a Farmhouse Ale at 85+ F from the start. Got a lot of fruit flavor from the yeast. Seems Brett-C (White Labs strain) likes it hot, and is subdued at lower temperatures.

 

[ZebulonBrewer]

Subbed. I'd like to see what you come up with.

 

[estricklin]

Ok I couldn't wait any longer, so I popped open a blueberry ale tonight, it could use a few more days in the bottle but 90% of the carbonation was there. I will update this post in another week or so, just wanted something preliminary for now I guess.

The kegged blueberry ale brewed with US-05 is on the left, and the bottled blueberry ale with Wyeast is on the right next to the bottle.

First off, these are different beers. Not WAY different, but if I handed someone both and said "hey I'm trying to figure out which recipe is best", no one would question them being the same beer with different yeast.

The Irish Ale is unpleasant for me. It hurts me to type that, because I swear by that yeast. There's a malty sweetness that comes through the blueberry, maybe with a teeny weeny bit of diacetyl. It's that same character that I love in my house oatmeal stout recipe that I've brewed a bazillion times, but it doesn't go with this beer at all. This beer doesn't taste as bitter either, and much less blueberry flavor. This beer has a stronger smell also. The only thing I can compare the taste to, is the smell of LME when you first open the can.

Now the 05. It's more like a blueberry wine cooler than a beer, except it's quite dry. Not much sweetness, but I get a huge whack of blueberries when I take a sip. Some of the harsher bitterness from the blueberries comes through, but not in a bad way. I don't taste any malt, hops, and really no sweetness. It's very enjoyable, but might be better if it weren't so dry. From now on I will be sure and take FG readings, but I don't have any for these beers.

Here is the recipe:
10 gallons
8 oz C40
5 lbs Munich 10L
15 lbs Maris Otter
1 oz Northern Brewer 60 min
1 oz Citra 60 min
OG was 1.054
64F for 2 weeks then cold crashed for a week
The 05 was pitched with a fresh dry packet, and the Irish Ale was pitched from a harvested yeast cake, I pitched about maybe 350 ml of medium slurry, that was a couple months old. I certainly hope my pitching rates aren't skewing the results any.

Anyway as I said, will update this post again later most likely.

I didn't mention it before, but if anyone is so interested that they want to taste some of these too, say when I get 4 or 5 batches built up and bottled, I don't mine mailing some out if a person was willing to pay for the shipping.

 

[badlee]

Like what you are doing.
Have you ever thought f putting a cool Notty fermentation up against a lager strain?
Asking because I have used Notty at 14c plenty of times and this last time is is SOOOOOOO clean and crisp that I am kind of let down a little.

 

[joshesmusica]

interested as well. wish more people would be doing these types of experiments, although the simple tasting notes are going to be quite subjective, it gives an idea of what to expect.

i prefer ales, so i'm working on getting my BIAB processes down and creating some consistency with it, then i'll be doing all kinds of brulosopher type experiments than i'll be posting on a blog. i like that you're posting your results here, but it could be cool to get a blog going, with links to specific strains. if people get interested in you mailing your beers to them, you could then post those up there too. just an idea, but definitely still want to hear about future results!

 

[estricklin]

Like what you are doing.
Have you ever thought f putting a cool Notty fermentation up against a lager strain?
Asking because I have used Notty at 14c plenty of times and this last time is is SOOOOOOO clean and crisp that I am kind of let down a little.

Haven't yet, but wouldn't mind trying it at all. I used to brew with Notty all the time and kind of got out of the habit in favor of 04 in those types of beers. I've never ran Notty really low, BUT I've read good things about those who have tried it. I do know from personal experience, that Notty does NOT like to be above 70F, yuck! I will pick up some Notty on my next haul, we'll see what happens.

interested as well. wish more people would be doing these types of experiments, although the simple tasting notes are going to be quite subjective, it gives an idea of what to expect.

i prefer ales, so i'm working on getting my BIAB processes down and creating some consistency with it, then i'll be doing all kinds of brulosopher type experiments than i'll be posting on a blog. i like that you're posting your results here, but it could be cool to get a blog going, with links to specific strains. if people get interested in you mailing your beers to them, you could then post those up there too. just an idea, but definitely still want to hear about future results!

They are subjective, and I admit that anything I can do here is really a meager attempt at solid proof about yeast strain flavors, but it's the best I can do and certainly might help some others to understand this "yeast' thing better.

I wouldn't mind doing a blog but right now I keep a website going for my local ham radio club, and it's a ton of work to write articles for it, update lists and things of that nature. If I am able to mass enough information though, I definitely want to get it out there and share it.

 

[estricklin]

Ok I couldn't wait any longer, so I popped open a blueberry ale tonight, it could use a few more days in the bottle but 90% of the carbonation was there. I will update this post in another week or so, just wanted something preliminary for now I guess.

The kegged blueberry ale brewed with US-05 is on the left, and the bottled blueberry ale with Wyeast is on the right next to the bottle.

First off, these are different beers. Not WAY different, but if I handed someone both and said "hey I'm trying to figure out which recipe is best", no one would question them being the same beer with different yeast.

The Irish Ale is unpleasant for me. It hurts me to type that, because I swear by that yeast. There's a malty sweetness that comes through the blueberry, maybe with a teeny weeny bit of diacetyl. It's that same character that I love in my house oatmeal stout recipe that I've brewed a bazillion times, but it doesn't go with this beer at all. This beer doesn't taste as bitter either, and much less blueberry flavor. This beer has a stronger smell also. The only thing I can compare the taste to, is the smell of LME when you first open the can.

Now the 05. It's more like a blueberry wine cooler than a beer, except it's quite dry. Not much sweetness, but I get a huge whack of blueberries when I take a sip. Some of the harsher bitterness from the blueberries comes through, but not in a bad way. I don't taste any malt, hops, and really no sweetness. It's very enjoyable, but might be better if it weren't so dry. From now on I will be sure and take FG readings, but I don't have any for these beers.

Here is the recipe:
10 gallons
8 oz C40
5 lbs Munich 10L
15 lbs Maris Otter
1 oz Northern Brewer 60 min
1 oz Citra 60 min
OG was 1.054
64F for 2 weeks then cold crashed for a week
The 05 was pitched with a fresh dry packet, and the Irish Ale was pitched from a harvested yeast cake, I pitched about maybe 350 ml of medium slurry, that was a couple months old. I certainly hope my pitching rates aren't skewing the results any.

Anyway as I said, will update this post again later most likely.

I didn't mention it before, but if anyone is so interested that they want to taste some of these too, say when I get 4 or 5 batches built up and bottled, I don't mine mailing some out if a person was willing to pay for the shipping.

Update 7/30/15

After a 2-3 more weeks the beers started to taste quite similar. In the end my vote was for the 05 though, the fruit flavor was still brighter in that one. The Irish Ale still had a touch more sweetness, but even in a side by side difficult to tell. The strange malty sweetness vanished after a little bit of time in the bottle.

 

[Yooper]

Interesting! Thanks for the follow up.

I use two different yeasts in a batch all the time.

I'm making a pale ale tomorrow, and I'll use WLP001 in one fermenter, and I'm not sure which in the other (but I'd better get going on the starter, so I should make up my mind pretty soon!).

I always make 10 gallon batches, so it's just a usual thing for me to split them.

 

[Dog House Brew]

I too brew larger batches. I split batches almost every time I brew. Amazing how different the beers turn out. I haven't brewed with 001 in a while. I really like 007. I think I may split my IPA with it Saturday. Doing 15 gallons of Kolsch and doing 1007, 029, and Giga. Nice thread thanks.

 

[estricklin]

I brewed a Shiner Bock clone and pitched 34/70 into one fermenter, and Coates De Blanc in the other about 3-4 months ago. The gravity on the wine yeast was lower by a smidge, 1.012 vs. 1.010 I think. HUGE taste difference. The Coates is flat out disgusting. I fermented it at 65F. It tastes like someone poured bad wine into the beer almost. Even after this much aging it just isn't very pleasant. We'll see what happens over time, trust me it isn't going to be drank very soon. The 34/70 version is fine, very smooth and basically as I expected it to taste. This was a split 10 gallon batch.

I did a 15 gallon batch of spiced pumpkin beer. I pitched the 34/70 I harvested from the Shiner Bock clone into 2 of the 3 fermenters on this brew. The other got a fresh pack of 05. I am going to keg the 05 in the next day or 2 and side by side it against the lager yeast. I purposely pitched a lot more yeast into one of the 34/70s as I did the other, so far I cannot taste any difference at all, I should say that they one got more than the other, they both had "enough" cells. I did not take any gravity readings because the pumpkin always messes with them since I put my pumpkin in during the end of the boil.

 

[estricklin]

Sorry I haven't updated more but I haven't brewed much since I have been working on converting my brewery over to electric.

I did want to give and update on the Shiner with the Coates yeast, after a little more time it became tolerable, and actually pretty good. Still I would prefer the 34/70 version, and I would be hesitant to use wine yeast in a beer after that experiment. I might try it on something that involves wood and lots of aging though, say a Bourbon Barrel Porter.