Does the type of yeast really matter ?

[Fxaddicted]

LalBrew recently announced a new strain of yeast called "NovaLager" . as you can see it's for lager beer . but what really Caught my attention the following

"no sulfur"
"strain will not produce hydrogen sulfide (H2S) off-flavors"
"Aroma and flavor is clean with low to medium ester"
"Alcohol Tolerance 13%"

The fact that this yeast doesn't produce sulfur made me think this would be great for neutral

What you guys think about Yeast in general when it come to distillation ?

[Dancing4dan]

Using Fleischmann's bread yeast never gives me any issues.

[Stonecutter]

The yeasties are critical. They are to be credited with the whole shebang.
The linchpin of all good spirits.
No doubt different strains will produce different esters in different environments.
The flavors may be subtle but they are there.

Now, having said all that IMO the most important thing is to keep them happy regardless of what strain you pick, be it bakers or some fancy beer strain.
Some yeasts are a little more forgiving. Like a golf club…

[Deplorable]

Im of the opinion that yeast matters for flavored spirits. For neutral, not so much since you're removing all the flavor anyway.
There is a reason proprietary yeast strains used by the big distilleries are closely held.
Whether it matters in your small batch craft spirits, is a matter of opinion, and I think you'll get several here. I've made a number of different whiskies, and only used 3 strains of yeast. Bakers yeast is not one that I prefer to use for whiskey. I've grown fond of what I get out of US-05 and T-58. There are a few others Id like to try at some point with different mash bills.

[Dougmatt]

To me, yeast represents a very small contribution to the final spirit profile, however this strain is interesting especially to me as I run a stainless rig. I’m always trying to get copper in the path to avoid the potential of sulfur taint. This yeast would seem to help minimize the risk of sulfur…

That is interesting at least at first read. I would buy this yeast to try in my stainless rig.

[jonnys_spirit]

Agree that the yeasties are important and experimentation is encouraged. Bakers, lager, ale, wine yeasts, whiskey/rum/agave yeasts, sake yeasts - natural yeasties. Lots of options.

Stay away from those turbo’s or not. Give em a try and compare but generally they aren’t recommended..

Cheers!
-j

[NZChris]

If you are determined not to use copper in the necessary places in your still, you should avoid producing H2S using every means available to you.

[shadylane]

The fact that this yeast doesn't produce sulfur made me think this would be great for neutral

What you guys think about Yeast in general when it come to distillation ?

For neutral, bakers is my go to yeast.
Ya don't need anything fancy, because the packed column is going to remove 99% of the flavors.
What's needed is no-drama yeast that can make 10% alcohol.

My 2nd yeast of choice would be EC1118, it's more expensive but also more forgiving.
It can work with less nutrients, a lower pH and temp than bakers yeast can.

[shadylane]

LalBrew recently announced a new strain of yeast called "NovaLager" .

Sounds like an excellent choice for lager beer.
If making whiskey, I think an ale yeast might be a better choice.

[Yummyrum]

For neutral, bakers is my go to yeast.
Ya don't need anything fancy, because the packed column is going to remove 99% of the flavors.
What's needed is no-drama yeast that can make 10% alcohol.

My 2nd yeast of choice would be EC1118, it's more expensive but also more forgiving.
It can work with less nutrients, a lower pH and temp than bakers yeast can.

I’d agree with that Shady .
Bakers yeast seems to do just about everything I need it to do ….. and its cheap and plentiful .
Agree that a good reflux still will sort any yeast based fermentation variants out . ( exception being I could still pick a Turbo with OTT sugar amounts )

EC1118 was always my goto but Bakers is it now .
Haven’t used EC1118 in years now . So long as I keep temps up , Bakers will pull through in a timely manner .

Only time I’ve used something else was SAFEale-05 for a bit of Whisky I made .

When it comes to Rum , Bakers is a no brainer .

[BlueSasquatch]

I used to think Yeast mattered little. Then I made some whiskey that knocked my socks off. After replicating the recipe, I was left quite disappointed. Based on my notes, I assume it was the temperature and time of the ferment, that produced the flavors I liked, as it was the only real difference. I'll know in about 2 more weeks, if I was right, or if it was a rogue infection? Anyways, I think yeast CAN play a huge role in flavor, but if you use the same stuff, in the same way, for everything, then you'll probably not notice. Sure all corn is corn, but red, yellow and blue all have rather distinct flavor profiles, IMO.

[jonnys_spirit]

If one is looking for an excuse to purchase some commercial whiskey you might try some of these four roses products. They say they use two different mash bills and five different yeast strains to produce 10 different products. I think it's likely that there's more at play with barrels, mash, ferment environment, and cuts but worth buying ten bottles and comparing

https://fourrosesbourbon.com/our-process/

Cheers,
jonny

[bilgriss]

My opinion - yeast impacts flavor. Different yeasts, with different combinations of nutrients, different temperatures, all will produce different ferments. BUT, I'd be hard pressed to make a statement about what's "better". Certain yeast strains will give you a more healthy ferment under different conditions, and that's something to consider.

[Ben]

The fact that this yeast doesn't produce sulfur made me think this would be great for neutral

Lager yeasts tend to throw sulfur (the ferments smell like rotten eggs with some strains), I don't think it applies much to what we do. Unless you need something that ferments in the 45-55° range it isn't worth the hassle. Working with lager yeasts presents a whole string of challenges, huge pitches, longer primary ferment times, resting phases. Could be interesting for a flavored spirit but not worth the squeeze on neutral.

Most ale yeasts don't produce sulfur (when fermented at appropriate temps).

Yes, yeast matters... matters less in a neutral. Pick something for your temp range with good attenuation and let it rip. If you are warm enough bakers or DADY.

[Steve Broady]

Yes, yeast matters... matters less in a neutral. Pick something for your temp range with good attenuation and let it rip. If you are warm enough bakers or DADY.

I’m a little surprised to see you recommending bakers or DADY. I reread that comment and realized you might be speaking only about neutral there, and that you might not recommend them for whiskey. Or have I misunderstood?

[Dougmatt]

My yeast experience is mostly with wine making not beer making which is where you hear the most “yeasty intrigue”. I’ve tried splitting wine batches and fermenting each half with different yeasts, I’ve even done the double pitch “thing”. To me, in the context of wine, the difference is minor. That’s not to say it’s irrelevant! People like to say, It’s like salt on your food, but then they suggest imagining food without salt, and food with salt and that’s the impact the yeast makes. I think a better analogy in different yeasts (for my experience in wine making) is, different salts from different parts of the world taste different, but the nuance is small and the impact of changing one for the other is also (to me) small. But then I’m not a Michelin starred chef, I just enjoy eating in their restaurants.

We also need to know the right yeast for the job…. For example I use ec-1118 on most champagnes, but I try not to use it on a flavored mash / wash / wine as it tends to strip flavor some. To me this analogy is less different salts, and more different cooking styles. Think chicken on the grill, versus boiled. It’s a mouthfeel AND flavor difference. But that’s all about the wine yeasts, so furthermore you wouldn’t use a lager yeast on wine, because that isn’t what it’s built for so you should use a strain that makes a “clean” product for your type of ferment.

Just some thoughts and opinions. Back to the OP, I like the idea of this yeast, because my preference for a still is stainless (oh the horror ), and feel the biggest copper benefit I look for is removal of sulfur. So while I don’t detect a lot of sulfur in my ferments which I believe is due to relatively clean process, I keep copper in the path just in case so a yeast that could actually guarantee no sulfur, is interesting.

[higgins]

I don't have enough stillin experience to say definitively whether or not the yeast makes a difference, but I do have a strong opinion that it does (for flavored distillates).

Years ago (15-20) I brewed a 5 gallon batch of English Bitter to do a yeast experiment. I split it into 6 1 gallon jugs and used 6 different English Ale yeasts. I bottled it (bottle conditioned) and took it to a homebrew club meeting where they were presented blind without any details of how they were made. Nearly all who sampled them thought they were 6 different beers, but the wort and fermentation conditions were identical, with the only difference being the yeast.

I realize that yeast contributes much more character to beer than to a distilled product, but I still think it matters. Why else would so many distilleries keep their proprietary yeast strains under lock and key?

I switched from DADY to FermSolutions FS917 for my bourbons for my last 2 batches and I think it made a difference - how much is too soon to tell.

[Bushman]

Bakers yeast is the most forgiving and cheapest so my advice is if your just starting get your feet wet with bakers yeast and after you feel comfortable with the process then you might want to experiment.

[Ben]

I’m a little surprised to see you recommending bakers or DADY. I reread that comment and realized you might be speaking only about neutral there, and that you might not recommend them for whiskey. Or have I misunderstood?

Evidently I didn't write that very clearly. Either is ok for making neutral, especially for someone who is new to the hobby. When your goal is almost complete absence of flavor, use the cheapest, most forgiving yeast you can... Sugar washes don't taste great, I don't think yeast is going to fix it... but a rectifying still can!

[Chucker]

Interesting thread here. I’ve not gone much into the yeast rabbit hole and have been focusing more on the grain bill and keeping the emphasis on the readily available home aspect. I started with DADY as it had high alcohol tolerance and I was initially greedy with sugarheads and yield. The more I began to pursue flavor over yield and finally graduated to AG fermentation I also started to go back to the basics of home fermentation and switched to plain ol bakers yeast (basic whiskey types).
While there may great commercial options available I’ve been using the basic premise that a good grain bill, good conversion, decent distillation, and good cuts are the fundamentals of good product. Maybe a more advanced yeast selection is the next step but I’m working under the assumption that the aforementioned steps are foundational. Aging methods follow the above. I think I’ve got nothing to complain about with what I’ve been obtaining thus far.
Nothing against trying other yeast varieties, and I probably will at some point in this journey, but I don’t think that yeast selection alone will be a magic bullet that turns everything around if the fundamentals are not first covered.
My still is ss with only a copper coil condenser. I don’t discern sulfur compounds in the distillate, and I’ve done some near neutrals using a commercially prepared neutral base that has prefiltered prior to distillation using reverse osmosis that has been darn good.

[shadylane]

Bakers yeast is the most forgiving and cheapest so my advice is if your just starting get your feet wet with bakers yeast and after you feel comfortable with the process then you might want to experiment.

Ya ain't kidding about the price difference.
I can buy a Kilo of bakers, for the cost of three 11 gram packets of ale yeast.

[Saltbush Bill]

Ya not kidding there Shady, I use bakers for a lot of things, a 280 gram tin at either of our to more popular supermarkets here in AU is $4.80 Au.
Recently been fiddling around with a whisky recipe and bought some of those 11 gram packs of US-05.......average price around these parts is $5.78 Au a pack. one pack of that size will fire up a 20-30L ferment according to the pack.....easy enough to stretch it further though.
There would want to be a pretty big flavour improvement over bakers for that kind of money. I can easily kick off 180L of Rum with a quarter can of Lowans ......that works out to roughly $1.20.
Interestingly , some of the home brew shops on line are starting to sell Bakers yeast.......Turbo sales must be down.
https://www.brewmart.com.au/pd.jsp?i=3585

[Ben]

If you use fancy yeast just propagate or recycle the cake, makes it nearly free... hardly makes sense for sugar based spirits though, not when bread yeast is an option.

[greggn]

Bakers yeast is the most forgiving and cheapest so my advice is if your just starting get your feet wet with bakers yeast and after you feel comfortable with the process then you might want to experiment.

Happily, I started out using active dry baker's yeast and have developed a repeatable process, from "farm to bottle", that creates the product I want. But this thread has made me wonder ...

Does fresh baker's yeast create a different flavor profile than dry ?

[bilgriss]

Different yeasts are different, produce different esters, ferment optimally at different temperatures, and produce different flavors.

One interesting note as to bakers vs. brewing yeasts. They're bred for different outcomes, although they do similar things. In particular, bakers yeast has been selected over time to maximize CO2 output, as it's primary purpose in selection is to help breads rise. In theory, CO2 bubbles rising through fermentations scrub small amounts of flavor and aroma from the ferment. That's why it's fun to sniff an airlock of a good fermenting beer, you can actually smell those volatiles as they bubble up.

There are dozens if not hundreds of side-by-side comparisons of the same beer fermented with different yeasts on the internet which will be revealed by a search. Here's one with an interesting visual component:

On the dry vs 'fresh' question - One classic beer example is Wyyeast 1056 vs US-05. Both are the famous "Chico" strain of a neutral ale yeast, selected to let hop and malt flavors shine through and not produce fermentation flavors. There is a ton of anecdotal evidence out there that the dry strain tends to yield a slight "peachy" flavor to a clean beer, especially at lower temperatures, and the fresh one does not. I've found them to be extremely similar, personally.