British Summer Ales, what yeasts?

[Bribie]

I'm a keen follower of Roger Protz on his Beer Pages and also the articles he writes for the Morning Advertiser. He was writing about the failure of MegaEvilBevCorp to sell some of their unwanted brands such as Bass, Boddingtons cask, Flowers etc. You'd think smaller brewers would be queuing up to buy Bass but apparently no interest.

Roger puts it down to a seismic shift in UK ales and especially the move to the new US-hopped Summer Ales and Blondes. I haven't been in the UK for over 12 years so haven't had the chance to drink any, but I'm wondering what the plan is:

UK malt obviously but no crystals
Some late US hops on top of the likes of Target?
So what yeast?

Do the breweries tend to go with their house yeasts or do they use US yeasts (along the lines of US-05, I wonder). I'm running up a blonde ale today with 100% Golden Promise, Simcoe plus Cascade, and planning on using Wyeast 1469 West Yorkshire as used in most TTL tributes.

[masterosouffle]

Hi,
The shift towards the American styles of craft beer has been fantastic in my view, as traditionally we have had a wide range of beers which within their own style were a bit samey and a lot failed to be very interesting. The newer styles are often heavily hopped, lighter and often quite a bit stronger, taking IPA from green kings dull favoured 3.6% to full flavoured beers averaging over 6% as they should be for this style.
As for yeasts, you're right US05 is very popular, as is WLP001 California ale yeast, both are very clean tasting which allow the hops to come through. There is a lot of experimentation with styles that would never have been considered by English breweries, such as blocks, Weiss beers and even black lagers!
Maris otter or regular pale malt works well, with the introductions of malts such as Munich, Vienna, rye as well as carafa's and smoked malts. Hops such as cascade, amarillo and centennial are proving very successful, but traditional hops like EKG are still being used but in line with the new styles such as gadds east Kent IPA http://gaddsbeershop.blogspot.co.uk/sea ... Kent%20IPA where before as you say something like target would be used, now anything can be used for bittering, and equally some hops which may have been considered bittering hops are being used successfully as aroma hops.
Simply put, the constraints brewers may have felt before have gone, they now feel free to make interesting, challenging and experimental beers, and as home brewers we have even more freedom to do anything we wish!

[orlando]

Best two posts I've read today, absolutely spot on.

[boingy]

And don't forget you can harvest the yeast from bottles of Hop Back Summer Lightning.

[Dennis King]

And don't forget you can harvest the yeast from bottles of Hop Back Summer Lightning.

Makes excellent beer, last few summers I've done this using Graham Wheelers summer lightning recipe. Very good.

[Patterd Ale]

Mine took off like nothing else I've seen. Twas either the yeast strain or a week of being lovingly stepped up compared to the usual rush job! Can anyone who has used it give any ideas of the character of the yeast?

[beernsurfing]

Bribie, I did a few UK blondes with US hops when I had a bag of halcyon pale. I think the GP will work well. I happen to have a bag of that at present. The best one I did had Golden naked oats, mmmmmm!!. Im drinking a galaxy pale ale, fermented with 1968. Lovely. I think US and UK ingredients can work well together. Let us know how it goes. Here's last years, the keg went quick, according to the notes!. 20 finished litres.

89% Halcyon pale
4.5% Golden naked oats
6.5% wheat
Galena 60min
Casacade 15mins
Amarillo 5min

cal chl in the mash. Single 65c temp mash.

1968

1.043
24IBU

20 litres finished wort

[Bribie]

I've just gone through a sack of Halcyon myself, and this brew is first cab off the rank for my new sack of TF Golden Promise. I actually have an American Wheat I'm going to run off into a cube for cold conditioning tomorrow and I've decided to use a cup of the saved yeast for this Summer Ale, it's Wyeast 1272 All American Ale / American Ale II - saves smacking a new pack

I'm also intrigued by the idea of incorporating the likes of Bobek and Aurora Super Styrians, I bet they would go great.