What is a good dry yeast for a best bitter?

[jceg316]

Mangrove Jack M42 derives from old Whitbread yeast in spite of its packaging name. Get it right and it's lovely, but it can be temperamental.

How do I get it right? Is that fermentation temperature?

 

[matt76]

In the mêlée of enzyme activity going on in the mash, a higher temperature- 68C+ tends to favour bigger polysaccharide chunks which are less fermentable, give more body and mouthfeel and are sweeter on the palate as the enzymes in your mouth quickly converts them to sweet sugars. A lower mash temperature tends to favour conversion to more fermentable sugars, which, being duly fermented, leave a stronger but "thinner" beer. S-04 has a lower attenuation than some other yeasts, which means that it struggles more with the bigger sugar chains. Keeping the mash temperature lower, then, means you'll get more alcohol and less sweetness. It all depends on what you like. I don't like sweet glugging beer and your crystal malt addition is already going to give you some of that. Nevertheless, S-04 probably strikes a happy medium between the yeasts I prefer and something like Danstar Windsor. Mangrove Jack M42 derives from old Whitbread yeast in spite of its packaging name. Get it right and it's lovely, but it can be temperamental. I'd stick with S-04, to be safe, and I like the thinking behind Hanglow's method, but I've never tried it.

Thanks for the explanation, I understand your point now

However I've gotta disagree with you regarding the sweet beer thing - I routinely mash high around 67-68degC, and sometimes deliberately at 70degC. I do it, in combination with a less attenuative yeast to create a more sessionable beer. The main challenge for me is that as I mash higher the exact FG seems harder to predict reliably.

But in my experience the resulting beer is not noticeably sweet - I wonder if this is a common myth?

I agree that mashing higher results in longer, less fermentable sugar chains and hence. But I read somewhere (might even have been this forum) that these longer sugars don't actually taste sweet - unfortunately I can't give a source for that so I may be wrong about the science

 

[MyQul]

If your going for ester's Liberty Bell is my go to for dry yeast for a bitter (when my brewing spot is in the yeasts correct temp range). I made one my best bitter ever with it (I suspect I accidently got the recipe balance absolutey perfect for my tastes).
CML Beoir is also good for bitters as the attenuation is only about 75% so leaves a beer malty. It is however quite clean, especially when you ferment it cold. So I'd suggest some knock out hops for more flavour. I'm still experimenting with this yeast but its my goto winter English ale yeast

 

[An Ankoù]

How do I get it right? Is that fermentation temperature?

I found that on some occasions, the brew begins to stink and that the smell can persist even into bottling. It does tend to disappear with age, so it's something the yeast is cleaning up. I had this happen twice and in both cases I think I stressed the yeast. The second time I added some yeast nutrient and that seemed to mitigate the pong. I don't really know why that happened and maybe it was a coincidence that it was with this yeast. There might have been other reasons as I was increasing the sulphate count in the liquor by adding up to 2 teaspoons so CaSO4 to a 23 litre batch. In each case, though, it was with harvested yeast from different batches and at different times. I didn't get any problems with fresh, rehydrated yeast.

 

[Hazelwood Brewery]

The science is sound, our palates are not!

I know there are things that other people swear by such as water treatment, sparge temperatures, rehydrating yeast, etc. You’ll see all these mistakes in my brewday post! I can’t say I can really tell much difference or attribute any difference to any one thing I’ve done. I get good beers ( in my view! ) so I’m not going to worry about things that are to me a bit theoretical. I’m not competing, I’m not insecure, and all my friends, family, neighbours like my beer too, including a beer taster that used to work for Courage.

@jceg316 I’d say if you want you try Empire Ale yeast, try it. You’re not likely to ruin your beer and whether you prefer one yeast over another is down to taste - ask 3 brewers, get 4 opinions! If you ferment around 20-22C you shouldn’t go far wrong.

 

[jceg316]

Thanks for the explanation, I understand your point now

However I've gotta disagree with you regarding the sweet beer thing - I routinely mash high around 67-68degC, and sometimes deliberately at 70degC. I do it, in combination with a less attenuative yeast to create a more sessionable beer. The main challenge for me is that as I mash higher the exact FG seems harder to predict reliably.

But in my experience the resulting beer is not noticeably sweet - I wonder if this is a common myth?

I agree that mashing higher results in longer, less fermentable sugar chains and hence. But I read somewhere (might even have been this forum) that these longer sugars don't actually taste sweet - unfortunately I can't give a source for that so I may be wrong about the science

Mashing high doesn't add perceived sweetness but adds body, although when I brew Czech pils I mash high, around 69°c, and I can't say it makes a huge difference. The last one I made is probably the best one I've made to date, it was just pilsner malt and WLP Budejovice yeast, mashed at 69 and fermented using the Brulosophy quick lager method. It did have a great texture but still wasn't quite as full as I was expecting.

 

[Sadfield]

Mashing high doesn't add perceived sweetness but adds body,

Of course it does. The higher the mash temp the more maltotriose. Some yeasts such as Windsor won't touch it, but even high attenuators like US05 will leave some in the beer. All these residual sugars left behind by the yeast add sweetness to beer, easily proven by brewing without any hop bitterness to balance it out.

http://www.nutrientsreview.com/carbs/oligosaccharides-maltotriose.html

 

[An Ankoù]

Mashing high doesn't add perceived sweetness but adds body, although when I brew Czech pils I mash high, around 69°c, and I can't say it makes a huge difference. The last one I made is probably the best one I've made to date, it was just pilsner malt and WLP Budejovice yeast, mashed at 69 and fermented using the Brulosophy quick lager method. It did have a great texture but still wasn't quite as full as I was expecting.

And so we come back to the vexed question of taste. These unfermentable carbohydrates include dextrins and trioses, which, as you say, add body and mouthfeel to the beer, but they begin to be broken down by salivary amylase into monosaccharides like glucose, which to me is sweet and even cloyingly so. Of course, if you down a pint of beer in one, the enzymes in the mouth don't get chance to work on it.
On the whole, I don't like sweet-tasting things, but that's a matter of personal preference.

 

[matt76]

Oops - double post

 

[matt76]

I'd use one packet of windsor then about 8 or 12 hours later pitch a packet of notty.

Have you brewed that before? That's a lot of brown malt for a bitter, they are quite variable in flavour as well, can add quite a bit of coffee at that amount. Also a fair amount of caramalt. I'd like to drink it though :)

Just a comment on this from personal experience;

The OP's recipe calls for 6.7% brown malt - last year I brewed an ESB with 8.9% brown malt. For sure the brown malt flavour was prominent but the finished beer was excellent - at least to my tastes and the feedback I got from some friends.

One thing I noticed was that when the beer was young (4 weeks after bottling) the brown malt flavour was quite prominent, though still very pleasant to drink. As it aged (up to about 6 months before I finished it) the flavours kind of rounded off a bit and became more mellow.

I have also read that brown malt can vary a bit - unfortunately I don't know where mine originated from as my LHBS repack their malt in they own branded bags.

So in a nutshell I think 6.7% brown malt in the OPS's recipe is a go-er

 

[jceg316]

This has been a good discussion, thanks for all of your inputs. After reading your suggestions and doing some of my own reading I'm gonna give MJ Liberty Bell a go.

 

[MyQul]

This has been a good discussion, thanks for all of your inputs. After reading your suggestions and doing some of my own reading I'm gonna give MJ Liberty Bell a go.

I was really pleased with MJ LB. I've always been curious about beers that have no late hops. So I made a bitter using LB with just a challenger bittering charge. It turned out superbly

 

[Clint]

Does anyone dry hop a bitter?

 

[The Baron]

good old trusty Wilko for me, it sticks like s*$t to a blanket

 

[The Baron]

I dry hopped a bitter with Fuggles once and did not like it. They do say sometimes to throw a few hops in the barrel as they used to do many years ago when casking but the dry hop I did was not good

 

[Sadfield]

I was really pleased with MJ LB. I've always been curious about beers that have no late hops. So I made a bitter using LB with just a challenger bittering charge. It turned out superbly

Good aren't they? An eye opener in regards of the view "use any hop for bittering it doesn't matter", I found. Did the character of Challenger carry through for you?

 

[MyQul]

Good aren't they? An eye opener in regards of the view "use any hop for bittering it doesn't matter", I found. Did the character of Challenger carry through for you?

A little but not a huge amount. What surprised me was that I got quite a malty, dark fruit flavour from the yeast

 

[An Ankoù]

Does anyone dry hop a bitter?

I do, usually. Just made a single hop bitter with Target and dry hopped for a couple of days with same. Bottling it tomorrow and it already tastes good.

 

[Horners]

I do, usually. Just made a single hop bitter with Target and dry hopped for a couple of days with same. Bottling it tomorrow and it already tastes good.

Yep plus one for target recently - a few of the Wheeler ones in BYOBRA he recommends a handful of cones going in the cask

 

[matt76]

Does anyone dry hop a bitter?

Yeah, I dry hopped the aforementioned ESB with some EKG and it worked out really well. Actually had I not done so I think the brown malt might have been a little too much, but as it was the malt and the hops played off against one another really nicely