Finding Harder To Find Yeast Strains – Bootleg Biology, The Yeast Bay, East Coast Yeast and More
White Labs and Wyeast are pretty well ubiquitous. Most shops carry both or at least one of these great lineups. In addition to their many regular options, both companies periodically have special seasonal releases. They produce outstanding yeast, bacterias and blends.
If you’re looking to try something new… This post aims to help you find some of the smaller yeast houses
- Bootleg Biology! – “Bootleg Biology is an open source yeast (and wild bugs) project whose goal is to create the world’s most diverse library of microbes for the creation of fermented foods and beverages. All microbes are sourced and isolated from “bootleg” sources such as: backyards, orchards, kombucha, yogurt, honey, fruit, bottle dregs, and whatever else we can get our hands on.” – MoreBeer
- East Coast Yeast – ECY’s mission is: “To provide new, fresh, liquid cultures for your special brewing projects. Specializing in artisanal yeast blends and pure yeast strains long forgotten.” – East Coast Yeast has gone out of business 🙁
- Imperial Yeast – A new lab in Portland, Oregon who is making liquid yeast for both commercial breweries and homebrewers. Each pouch boasts a whopping 200 Billion cells, providing what is considered the ideal pitch rate for five gallons of beer. This high cell count will result in a very fast start to your fermentation. A short lag time between cooling and active fermentation reduces the risk of bacteria or wild yeast taking hold. With this much yeast there is no need to make a starter in most situations. Imperial recommends that you store cold until use and then immediately pitch. Open the pouch slowly to release any potential pressure. – MoreBeer – Great Fermentations – Beer & Wine Hobby
- The Yeast Bay – The Yeast Bay’s Missions – “Provide commercially unavailable and rare strains of yeast and bacteria to the homebrewing and craft brewing communities in high quality liquid culture.” – The Yeast Bay has partnered with White Labs to provide select strains to homebrewers
- GigaYeast – produces pitches with 200 billion yeast cells. Nearly double the cell count of most homebrew yeast producers. The lineup include GY054 “Vermont IPA” which is the Conan strain of yeast used by Alchemist Brewing to make Heady Topper. – now largely unavailable to homebrewers. MoreBeer has large pitches available for special order
- Omega Labs Yeast – Omega Labs includes 150 billion cells (50% more yeast vs a more typical 100 billion cell homebrew pitch). They also have some interesting strains including an “Ale strain isolated from a famous double IPA brewed in Vermont”. We’re probably talking about the “Conan” strain used in the Alchemists’s nearly impossible to find Heady Topper. – MoreBeer – Beer & Wine Hobby – Great Fermentations
- Cellar Science – For years liquid yeast has been sold as the higher quality option but times are changing. Yes, 20 years ago dry yeast was made by bread yeast producers and the quality was not as good as liquid yeast. CellarScience is helping to flip that script with the release of five high quality dry yeasts. Cell count and viability is usually higher than commercial liquid yeast pitches which vary from batch to batch. CellarScience yeast can be pitched directly in most worts, offering significant time savings. Yeast that is quick and easy to use, high quality, and available at a reasonable cost adds up to a tremendous value. For high gravity ferments consider rehydrating CellarScience yeast with FermStart. MoreBeer
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Periodically White Labs and Wyeast produce limited edition strains. These short run yeasts are a great way to try something new.
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