yeast question

[gremlin]

for probably 3/4's of the homebrews i have made, i have used 2 different kinds of yeast. usually a lager and an ale yeast. i figure this will cover any temperature swings that happen. i also try to use dry yeast and liquid yeast at the same time.

so could anything bad happen? all of the beers fermented great and came out bubbling and tasting good. but i was talking to a guy who owned a brewery (i'm not sure how much he had to do with the actual brewing), and he said i should never ever do this. is it bad to mix yeast types and liquid/dry yeast?

like i said, i never had any problems. but i have never hard of this being done before! am i just crazy?! any advice or opinions?

barrett

 

[rod]

my opinion(for what its worth) is that you are inviting off flavours(lager yeast at ale temps)
but if you like the taste and aren't concerned with duplicating a certain style then more power to you.
this is a hobby to experiment with, with the benefit of drinking your results

 

[Kaiser]

for probably 3/4's of the homebrews i have made, i have used 2 different kinds of yeast. usually a lager and an ale yeast. i figure this will cover any temperature swings that happen. i also try to use dry yeast and liquid yeast at the same time.

so could anything bad happen? all of the beers fermented great and came out bubbling and tasting good. but i was talking to a guy who owned a brewery (i'm not sure how much he had to do with the actual brewing), and he said i should never ever do this. is it bad to mix yeast types and liquid/dry yeast?

Mixing liquid and dry yeast shouldn't be a problem. But it is not commonly done since there is no need and you don't really know which strain will actually dominate the flavor. But if the strains used are fairly neutral, that shouldn't matter.

But mixing top and bottom fermenting yeast in the same wort. The only time I have heard about this is when I read about a new beer style in Germany. It's called Weissbierpils and fermented with lager and ale yeast. The guy who came up with this even got a patent on this since it is not as straight forward to do this. I'm not sure how it works. In your case, one yeast probably dominated over another yeast. And in the end I think it should work but the results may not be as reproducible as if you would use only one strain of yeast.

Kai

 

[Ivan Lendl]

i have used a lager and an ale yeast. i figure this will cover any temperature swings that happen. any advice or opinions?

barrett

id say try to eliminate the temp 'swings'...no matter what kind of yeast you use, none of them like drastic temp changes. a few degrees here and there is no big deal.

 

[david_42]

You're wasting the price of one of the yeast packets. Better temperature control is really the way to go. Even if you do nothing more than wrap the fermentor in a blanket.

If you have a mudroom (and what Vermonter doesn't?), consider insulating part of the room as a fermentation cabinet.