BEGINNER'S INTRODUCTION TO YEAST
So you're back for another installment of that beginner series about yeast. Well, you know, we're so glad to have you. And of course, if you get an opportunity, share this site with your family and friends. You're going to need Means of fermentation.
Now, what First of all, let's start this in order to keep it straightforward. I've got a bunch here to show you. But let's start off with what is necessary in order to have a successful fermentation. All we need is water sugars in yeast. That's the bare essential. If you've got those three things in the right environment, you are going to produce alcohol. It's totally dependent on what you use and how you do it, but the basics are water, sugars, yeast.
That's it and we're going to focus today on just yeast alone. so yeast. Now there are thousands upon thousands of strains of this stuff. It's everywhere. It's probably one of the most prominent single-cell organisms in the world. And it's responsible for a lot of it's on your body. It's in the air. It's on the tree. It's everywhere. Known as wild yeast.
Now, humans have had the capability for a long time. Time to cultivate. Corn, wheat, rice. So what we've got is a couple of different variations of the exact same thing. Let's talk about beer brewing first because we're going to go beer wine, cider Saki and then we're going to go distilling. We're going to do it all. In the beer brewing world. There are basically two types of yeast.
We have an ALE and we have a LAGER. The difference between the two really is where they ferment and at what temperature an area yeast is it most of us are familiar with it a beer. I like an ALE, normally a crisper beer. A little bit lighter-bodied, but it's brewed. It's a top-fermenting yeast on top and middle.
And that ferments depending on the strain that you get are the different temperatures, it can be, 72 degrees, it could be 78 degrees, it could be 81 degrees. My point is, this is a top brewing yeast. And then you have a LAGER, which is a German term. Let's set lager they used to make beer in a colder temperature in the ground under some of the sellers. And they developed a strain of yeast that works best at lower temperatures. And it's also known as a bottom-fermenting yeast. And that's the lager yeast. So that's your beer world.
They both do the same thing. They convert fermentable sugars from sugars into alcohol and the byproduct is Co2. Yeasts are capable of operating their anaerobic environment or anaerobic environment meaning with or without oxygen.
They require oxygen, first of all, to develop a colony to get going. That's why we always say that oxygen is your best friend in the beginning. After fermentation starts, oxygen is your worst enemy. So you oxygenate, it's by Stern, mixing whatever, just get oxygen in your wart. And that's what we call it for beer. And your yeast will be absolutely happy, don't want that oxygen, but then now they're in that anaerobic phase. And they will always default to the one thing that they do best, produce alcohol.
Now there are some basics that you just need to really understand. They're relatively simple. Beer, yeast, wine, yeast, wine, yeast, bread, yeast, turbo yeast. cider yeast is a little bit strange. It's the Koji cannon for Saki and distillers yeast.
All the same family, but different capabilities. Let's take this one by one. This one's made by safe water. Fermentis is a company that just makes a bunch of specialty yeasts and they cultivate this yeast for different purposes.
You have a safe lager. This is the 3470 of course, they all have purposes. But that's there's a US safe ale, which is really popular. At least it's an American version or the European version.
This one will give you off florals some of those other flavors and characteristics in a beer that you don't normally get in one of these. So he plays an important role in some of the flavor profiles. And then we have of course the sale web.
So those are beer yeasts. In these beer Easter capable they have all yeast have a different tolerance level when it comes to alcohol, or any of these will work for just about anything but your anticipation your ex dictation should not be any higher than about somewhere between six and a half to seven and a half percent.
So a really good beer for most people is somewhere around the four to 5% range. You have some hardcore that wanted stronger and that's it and you can do that, but these are perfect for that. Now, remember when you get above 8%, you're no longer having a beer. We got barley wine. That's another story in itself. The monks make farming wine when they make a real attack or Trappist. Those all yeasts are used for.
Red Star makes several different varieties as well. Now in a wine yeast, you can expect an alcohol tolerance level if all things are perfect in the neighborhood of around 12 to 14%. That's sort of like a ballpark. And again, it's totally dependent upon what you're doing and how you're doing it. Not necessarily what you're using at that point. And we've got everything here from A to Z to A coat a blank for white wine.
Here's one for a premier blank white wine. Here's one for a pasture red for red wine. And these are just small satchels. These are good for six gallons. This is one of them.
These are 11.5 grams. five grams. 11.5 grams and this is for a beer on this is for wine.
Why don't we go through this?
This is really interesting though. And it's nice to understand everything about the yeast, And we're going to get to why they're weighted the way they are. Out Loud when makes wine yeast,
They surely make a lot of different yeast, ec 1118 is probably one of the most popular all around, go to yeast for winemakers. It's just an EC 1118. That's the number of it or the name of it. here's a KV 1116, seven 171, b 1122. You've got all these different varieties.
Now, what are these good for? These are good for different styles of wine, you know, you're making a good white wine or you're making a great wine. You want a really dry wine, or you want something that's relatively sweet and that you can manipulate.
What is also good is that if you're making a really good Mead, as a matter of fact, underneath 1118 is really good for that meat is a honey wine and something should happen.
Pull out a K one v 1116, which is a slightly different family strain of yeast, and drop that in there, it will not compete, it will probably just rejuvenate and take over. And rescue and otherwise stuck.
Permutation is not amazing. It's just that simple. We have safe cider. It is for making cider. That's all that's available. There's probably hundreds of those that are available. Now we go back then we go down to Fleischmanns, yeast. Fleischmann’s bread, yeast. Now, will it work slowly? Is it dependable? Absolutely not. You know the cost of Fleischmann’s yeast compared to be released When yeast is either the same or more expensive. But its alcohol tolerance level range is somewhere in the three to 4% range. And it's a lower strain. Because sugar dehydrates yeast. So when you have a high sugar content and you use bread, yeast, you have a tendency to stall it because it'll be hydrated and it'll stop.
Just a hint. It's totally up to you. Will it work? Yes, in most cases, or in a lot of cases, is it dependable? I don't use it because I can't depend on it. Sometimes. it'll produce 11% sometimes it'll produce 2%. But it's just totally up to you.
Now you have one turbo V's, I just got one of these packs laying around and figured out how to bring it out to you. And this is a larger pack. And as a matter of fact, the contents of this one all got 76 grams 2.7 ounces.
There are probably around 10 to 15 grams at most of the yeast in here. And the rest of it is yeast nutrient, it is called dp diammonium phosphate, and some other things, some dead yeast holes and things like that's what makes it a turbo yeast. Because it just gives it a whole lot of energy, a lot of free amino nitrogens I called a fan. You'll hear that term every once in a while you just need to understand these terms. Because all it is someone else trying to sound super smart.
So that's your turbo and remember one of these is good for like a six-seven gallon bucket just dump the whole thing in there. Then of course you have what we call Daddy, distillers active dry yeast all together as da D white, distillers active dry yeast is the daddy.
This is distillers active dry yeast. It looks the same. It is the same, but it is a different culture. It is developed and designed to have a taller level up to around 18%
just like champagne yeast. That'll fix it. Champagne yeast will fix it, but no flavor profile to speak of. But it'll fix it. But the still active dry yeast will also make beer, it'll make wine, it'll make cider, it'll make whiskey.
In short, beer yeast will make beer, wine will make cider and could potentially make whiskey.
Why does it need to do the same thing?
It's all in how you manipulate and how you do what you're doing. You know, controlling your environment, making sure you're aerated, making sure you have enough nutrients free amino nitrogen diammonium phosphate.
Those are the chemicals you don't absolutely have to have, but they're just nice to have.
Either way, it'll work. 15 billion to start with you, what you're trying to do is develop a yeast colony, okay, and an active yeast colony. Yeast is a living organism. So it has a chronological life, as well as it has a reproductive life, and its reproductive life span is normally around 2017 to 22, meaning that an individual yeast cell can produce 17 22 daughter cells before it becomes too old and decrepit, and can no longer produce so it kind of drops out. It becomes fodder and food for others.
So you start at 15 billion. And if you start using the numbers, you shake a stick at
five grams. What's that? Tell us if we've got 11.5 here, we got five grams here. Well, that just tells us that this is a little bit more active because it develops a yeast colony in about the same amount of time this does. You see, there's your difference in your streams. Your strains are developed as a sub root of this to do different things.
This is the hydrometer. This is a beer wine hydrometer but guess what it works with spirits as well. Because the basis of water sugars, yeast are all the same no matter what you're making, and you measure it the same way no matter what you're making. The only difference is that if you're distilling after the distillation process, you will use what is known as a proven trail hydrometer. And that's because the resulting liquid is so thin because it's such a high concentration of alcohol.
This scale will stop here, right below the level of water. This scale, which is the proof that a trail hydrometer will go from water is going thinner and thinner and thinner. So this will not work when you need this. You know, beer brewers borrow terms from winemakers, winemakers borrow terms from them. It all makes sense. This is an electronic digital pH meter. And this is in order to adjust the pH and the Ph. pH is just a measurement of alkalinity or acidity. Seven is the middle zero is acidic. 14 is alkaline, or called the base. Water city water is normally around the seven 7.5 yeast love acidic areas. It prevents any other bacteria from growing.
So, for whiskeys you're looking at a 5.2 is a real real good sweet spot beer somewhere around six that really works well and there are some wines that the acidic level is 3.2 but you're gonna do is look those up they'll tell you that. But by and large, just make sure you're below seven because that puts you in the acidic category which makes the environment more healthy for your yeast.
You put water in up to the line and it allows co2 one of the byproducts of yeast to escape and it doesn't allow oxygen to get back in remember, oxygens your worst enemy after fermentation begins and of course your three piece which is doing the same thing, just fill it up to the line and as a centerpiece will bounce up and down, allowing co2 to escape.
Well, I've covered a lot of information and I know that but it's important that you're armed with this information so that you can step forward in unlocking the secrets of whatever brewing process that you're interested in.
So there should no longer be that mystery of yeast what type II used to use, how are you or I get it from? I just want you to know that there are different purposes for different yeasts that have different alcohol tolerance levels for your purposes, so That's all I can offer you right now.
Hello, you stay tuned and we're going to go to the next one. As a matter of fact, we're going to probably cover sugars in our next discussion because that's another important aspect of making it: wart leaves, mash, whatever the case may be, they're all the same. That's what I like. That's what I love. I have so much love for this hobby, and sharing it with you makes it that much more enjoyable.