National Homebrew Club Ireland

Folks,

I recently starting messing with dried yeasts. I did a batch with US04 and it has a certain 'bang' off it.
I would equate it to a mild infection or querky yeast.

Whats the general vibe on US04, anyone had any issues with it ??

I notice this instruction


Alternatively, pitch the yeast directly in the fermentation vessel providing the temperature of the wort is above 20°C (68°F). Progressively sprinkle
the dry yeast into the wort ensuring the yeast covers all the surface of wort available in order to avoid clumps. Leave for 30 minutes, then mix the
wort using aeration or by wort addition.

I lobbed mine in and stirred it up with a DRILL at high speed.

Perhaps I upset the yeast !!

Best to let the rehydrate on top of wort before the high speed drill.

Remember S-04 also flocculates out so may need rousing in the first 24 hrs or so.

Being an English yeast expect quite a bit more fruity character than the good aul WLP001/US-05/Chico.

Off flavours may just need conditioning to clear, more so than the US-05, which tends to be very clean & neutral.

There is a suggestion (myth?) that S04 = 1098 = WLP007 = Whitbread dry.

I don't like beers that use S-04. They taste infected to me. Not as noticeable in dark beers, but it ruins ales for me.

I stopped using the drill when someone on here flagged up about head retention in finished beer, Hop Bomb it could have been. Anyways nice fall and foam and nice healthy starter always get me going under 8 hours these days, unless Ive a lager or monster then I reach for the O2.


Edit for some of the deviants that read the above it refers to aeration and head retention in producing homebrewed beer and absolutely no stated or implied inference to sexual performance

We use S-04 in a few malt forward beers at GBB. Never any issue with it (unlike notty). Maybe its a vessel thing, It might not like flat bottom buckets?

Im nearly sure Alex Rye River told me a bunch of stuff about managing it. Cant remember much but rousing was one thing, & something about 1st gen being troublesome? I actually cant recall though so that could be a load of shite.

@OP, US04 or S05?

Interesting, I have found off flavour from s04, I changed yeast and got better results. I use flat bottom fv so perhaps your right hop bomb. So us05 is neutral?, might try that, would like to find a yeast as neutral and tolerant as possible

I can't stand S-04. I don't think I ever made a beer with it that I was happy with. I always say that it makes every beer taste like homebrew..  :-[ :-[

Long conditioning time can help, but you need to use the liquid strains if you want something approaching commercial quality in an English bitter/pale ale. IMO..

Yea, it kinda has a kit/Homebrew twang. Hard to describe.
Although perhaps I'd I prepared the yeast it might have helped.

The draw with dry yeast for me was the fact it required no preperation.
If I'm preparing yeast I may as well use wlp / wyeast.

We use it in Buried at Sea & Bay Ale in the core range beers. Bay Ale was never up to much but the new recipe is lovely. Worth a revisit especially on cask if you see it. Ive also used it in two scotch ales, Respect your Elders & Diving Bell. It works great for us here so maybe it loves conicals & a bit of head pressure. (We've a 400L yeast propagation tank coming with the new brewery & a lab thats almost operational so we'll be switching to liquid strains in June)

By the way, I've heard this before, using the drill damages head retention. I always use the drill , no problems with head formation.
I think ill do an experiment with splitting a weiss batch to put the rumor to bed for once and for all.

Quote from: Hop Bomb on January 19, 2016, 10:50:28 AM
We use it in Buried at Sea & Bay Ale in the core range beers. Bay Ale was never up to much but the new recipe is lovely. Worth a revisit especially on cask if you see it.

Glad to hear it's gotten a new recipe. Will give it a go next time I'm in a GBB pub.

Try it on a beer that doesn't have malts promoting head retention!

Foaming during transfer & aeration is normal. Excessive foaming during transfer & fermentation will effect foam formation. I think either Jamil Z or Charlie "pope of foam" Bamforth talked about it on a podcast (Charlie has a book or two on it). Some commercial breweries use anti foamers (we use hop oil based one at GBB) which increase capacity & yield from FVs. Hop aroma & bitterness is preserved as some of this would be lost in the foam spewing out of the blow off + you get better foam stability as the hydrophobic proteins are preserved also.

Quote from: Partridge9 on January 19, 2016, 10:48:51 AM
Yea, it kinda has a kit/Homebrew twang. Hard to describe.

I think the best descriptor I came up with for S-04 was 'yeasty'. Doesn't sound like a helpful descriptor, but it means beer that tastes immature from suspended yeast. A little bitter and bready.

I have used a drill to aerate my wort first, then add the rehydrated yeast (which i just stir in with a spoon).

I'm interested in hearing more about the issues with too much foaming during the aeration step?

Is the optimimum way to get some form of a whirlpool going, with as little foaming as possible, to aerate but not foam too much?

I went looking for that previous discussion and can't find it, I used to use a wine degasser and make walnut whips to the point that the foam was coming over the lid of the bucket and posed a pic. It was pointed out to me and sure enough I did about half my normal whizz and I got better headage on my brews.
One of our resident chemists I'm sure will explain what's going on at a molecular level.
I believe there is no issue with moderate aeration to get to your O2 saturation point, however all red blooded males suffer from a condition that only manifests itself when you put an electric drill in their hands in that they drill like ...k, a related condition can also be observed when sheering the head off screws.
So how much is too much more than 30 secs continuous to get a a 4-6 inch head I guess, maybe experiment?
All mine just get sloshed in now with either a pump or a fall to create foam and as I said before my focus is yeast viability

I use pure o2 and my fermentation are def. Faster and cleaner. Also, so much easier to do.

I've found the same issue when using S-04. Just seems to be the characteristics of the flavour profile it provides. I won't use it now as a result, as most of the beers with it taste the same and are not very nice. I have a Irish red that I wish would have been great using this yeast. I was quite disappointed, until I changed the yeast. Happier now, as a result I won't use this yeast again.