What are you brewing this weekend

[Will_D]

Wasn't lager yeast the first to be isolated and also at the same time Louis Pasteur started doing the round,

The word on the street was that he was paid by Mr. Carlslberg and hence the strain name Saccromycese Carlsbegensis.

Now, for the really sad (count me in) have a read here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saccharomyces_pastorianus

[cruiscinlan]

"Why did lager beer become so popular? At the time lager yeast was discovered, most ale fermentations contained some wild yeast and bacteria and the resulting beer had a very short shelf life. Lager beer could be fermented cool, which suppressed the growth of wild yeast and bacteria. (Modern lager brewers tend to have problems with Pediococcus because of the slower fermentation, but they likely have less problems than pre-modern ale brewers.) Lager beer therefore had a longer shelf life, which meant greater distribution area and increased sales. Breweries probably began to switch to lager brewing to increase their sales."

Hmmm this doesn't make sense to me though.  At a time when beer was casked and transported as such lager would've been treated the same as other beers.  Also wild yeasts (and certainly brett) and bacteria were considered part of the character of beer at the time.  Strong bottled beer will keep for years/decades as well, so I'm confused as to why they put it down to spoilage.

Hansen is supposed to have named S. Pastorianus as Carlsbergensis but as he worked in the brewery there's no surprise there.  FYI the Carslberg strain came from Spaten.

[Jonnycheech]

Hmmm this doesn't make sense to me though.  At a time when beer was casked and transported as such lager would've been treated the same as other beers.  Also wild yeasts (and certainly brett) and bacteria were considered part of the character of beer at the time.  Strong bottled beer will keep for years/decades as well, so I'm confused as to why they put it down to spoilage.

It makes perfect sense to me that in a time when it wasn't possible to keep a high level of sanitation, a beer that was fermented at a lower temperature to ale, and then subsequently lagered at an even lower temperature for an extended period would keep longer than ale. Maybe they are referring to local beer that wasn't transported. If this was the case the beer could be kept at lagering temps or cellar temps indefinitely, thereby increasing potential shelf life.

[mr hoppy]

Who wrote that piece from BYO? Some of its writers are  fond of unsourced historical speculation.


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[Jonnycheech]

Sorry the article is actually from 2004, thought it was this years. Anyway it's from some chap called Chris White, apparently he knows a thing or two about yeast 

http://byo.com/stories/issue/item/460-choose-the-right-yeast-for-your-beer