Your favorite English ale yeast with personality?

[Dennis King]

yep that's the one.

[zgoda]

I don't buy yeast because of its name. Wyeast calls its W34 a "Bohemian Lager", while it is German, and is rarely used by Czech breweries.

[Dr. Dextrin]

In matters such as this I'm afraid I take anything I read on the internet with a large pinch of salt, unless reliable sources are cited. It's far too easy for one person's speculation to be copied and copied until it becomes "fact".

I know the yeast labs generally don't attribute yeast strains to breweries. So to be convincing, someone would have to culture a yeast obtained from a brewery (or one of their beers) and show it behaved the same in all (or at least most) aspects as the supposed "same" strain bought from a yeast bank. I don't think that sort of test has been widely carried out. Possibly the only case that'd really convince me, in fact, is the Fullers strain because of its popularity and easy availability from both sources.

That's not to say that attribution lists aren't useful, but only as a guide to yeast type, IMHO.

[seymour]

As Graham said a while ago can't believe Boddingtons is a London strain and Henleys a Burton. Apart from the geographical distant I don't see any likeness.

That makes sense. But don't place much importance on Wyeast and White Labs naming. An obvious inconsistency in their marketing doesn't necessarily mean the supposed origin should be thrown out the window.

I don't buy yeast because of its name. Wyeast calls its W34 a "Bohemian Lager", while it is German, and is rarely used by Czech breweries.

+1
That makes sense. The Boheme region has been claimed by many different nations over time, and who knows if it's a reference to a brewery in Bohemia, a style from Bohemia, a yeast archive in Bohemia, a Bohemian brewer who migrated to South America and carried along a yeast culture to reproduce beer from his homeland, etc. The name is largely useless.

In matters such as this I'm afraid I take anything I read on the internet with a large pinch of salt, unless reliable sources are cited. It's far too easy for one person's speculation to be copied and copied until it becomes "fact"…That's not to say that attribution lists aren't useful, but only as a guide to yeast type, IMHO.

+1


Thank you for sharing that old thread, it was very interesting, if overly heated. To read Kristen England and Graham Wheeler arguing about such a narrow area of interest of mine was illuminatory. I consider them both experts, highly knowledgeable, and worthy adversaries (who surely have more in common than that thread would indicate.)

First, my own research is not simply cut-and-pasted from Kristen England's online Mr Malty tables which are so often quoted as fact. It's a certain starting point for many of us, obviously, but my ongoing research has verified the truth of some of it, come up with some of the same most-likely conclusions, but revealed inconsistencies and errors as well. I've spoken-up about some of them here, as many of you know. For instance, the whole Whitbread-dry/Whitbread-B matter, which I am glad to report Graham Wheeler helped straighten-out for me.

I'll also say some of Graham Wheeler's arguments are stronger than others. I'll probably misrepresent him to some degree but here are some of my thoughts, should anyone care.

The supposed brewery strains don't produce beer which is anything like the beers I remember tasting from said breweries.
True, of course, but this could be due to many factors. As Graham said, if the brewery used a multi-strain, and if the labs culled just one of the strains, they can accurately state it came from that brewery, but of course the fermentation will be different. Again as Graham argued, that single-strain through propogation in the lab has morphed somewhat and certainly lost many of the unique properties which affected fermentation in the brewery. And the brewery's own strain has continued to morph somewhat through repetitions, updates in brewery equipment designs and processes, etc. Or, the brewery stopped using that strain entirely, when bought-out, or relocated, or because of poor performance, or because of costs to maintain, or a million other reasons. Even if it's the exact same strain, a homebrewers ingredients, equipment, techniques, timing, and chemical reactions are different, so the beer will come out different. But that doesn't make Kristen England's painstaking research patently false.

In other words: it could be true that White Labs WLP013 and Wyeast 1028, no matter what name they're marketed under, did in fact come from one of many strains once used at the brewery which makes Worthington White Shield. Those are a lot of caveats, but they don't amount to "pure fantasy." It could also be true that making a beer with White Labs WLP013 and/or Wyeast 1028 would taste nothing like Worthington White Shield, for a million reasons. It could also be true that whoever now brews Worthington White Shield, wherever Worthington White Shield is brewed, no longer uses the strain White Labs and Wyeast long ago snuck. And, let us not negate the untrustworthiness of something as subjective as taste and memory, especially years or decades later. I have enormous respect for Graham's taste declarations, but I'm constantly surprised when I look at my tasting notes from years past and realize my opinion has changed, or my memory changed, or my attitudes have changed, or my very tastebuds have evolved or devolved even with regards to an unchanged beer, unchanged brewery, unchanged brewing process (if such a thing can even exist.) I'm sure you all have similar experiences, and I'm sure even Graham is made of similar stuff.

The brewery which the strain is supposedly from isn't even located in the city named in its marketing.
This is the weak part of his argument, in my opinion. Who knows why White Labs and Wyeast name and market the strains as they do? Is the strain from a brewery in that city/region, a brewing conglomerate headquartered in that city/region, once resided in that city/region but since relocated? Is it meant to produce beer which is reminiscent of a beer from that city/region? Again, who knows and really, who cares? Much of the truth about these strains is intentionally obscured for vague legal/business reasons. We hate it, but so be it. Hopefully no one is selecting their yeast strain simply based on its flimsy marketing. So much is unknown, so much is hidden, so much is untrustworthy, but to Graham's argument, I say: Kristen England, a PhD, a director of BJCP (which I also have some issues with, but still…), working extremely closely with the directors of the yeast labs in question, many of the commercial breweries in question, and many of the specific human being "yeast rustlers" who captured the yeasts from the breweries in question and provided them to the yeast labs in the first place with documented proof, surely knows some of what he's talking about. If he claims knowledge, cross-checked with several sources, that a particular strain came from a particularly brewery, I find that more believable than the vague marketing name stamped on it. In this context, whether the particular brewery has anything to do with the particular city is moot. In the broad sense of biology and evolution, brewers yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae) didn't originate in the UK, it didn't appear out of a vacuum fully prepared to brew in Burton nor London nor Chico, California; we don't know for sure whether it came from Bohemia, Sweden, Patagonia, the Russian Steppes, etc. What we do know is that it's here now, in many closely-related but diversely performing strains, and has had many generations of clever humans putting selective pressures on it to brew good beer.

As far as I'm concerned, Kristen ought to publish whatever he wants, and so should Graham. They both have merit, even when they disagree. Kristen shouldn't undermine the tremendous amount of research Graham conducts on English brewing history, composition, process, techniques, etc. Nor should Graham seek to completely invalidate Kristen's ongoing research into the origin of today's brewers yeasts. What use is that, in the grand scheme of things? For the record, Kristen nor the yeast labs have ever claimed using a particular strain will automatically always produce the beer brewed by the originating brewery. It's just one more piece of the puzzle which may or may not get you closer to reproducing the original, which seems to be the same mission as Graham's books, right?

If I could have my own selfish way, I wish Graham's next book would say something like, "When attempting to reproduce Worthington White Shield, you should select any classic English ale yeast which attenuates fairly dry but leaves some rich minerally malty sweetness and subtle fruity esters. Some have suggested White Labs WLP013, Wyeast 1028, BSI A-28, and Brew Lab blah-blah-blah were originally derived from this brewery, but results will vary. [insert any relevant tidbits about history, takeovers, etc.]"

I like online forum threads like this one, where actual brewers discuss the actual performance of actual yeast strains. Despite the source, despite the naming, what kind of beer did you actually get when you used fill-in-the-blank strain? Graham said he can't afford to try every yeast on every style and every recipe, but as "a cloud" we homebrewers of the world can and do. If we continue reporting our results back here, we can supplement the knowledge provided by experts like Kristen England and Graham Wheeler. I honestly didn't know the strain-origin theories were such a sensitive subject around here. I can dial it back in my submissions.

[stevetk189]

WLP002 here, it's turned some of my favourite beers that I really liked into favourite beers I really love now. Drops like a beauty in the FV (mine set at 19C), transfer to secondary is a lot clearer and by the time it's bottled it looks crystal clear. 1 week in bottle and there's a tiny coating of it on the bottle bottom that sticks like sh*t to a blanket. Carbonation wise, I'm going to have to back off my priming a little. I primed same as I'd done before, in each case, when using SO4 and found these brews with WLP002 to be a lot livelier, with a great, creamy and very dense head too.

[robbarwell]

WLP002 is simply superb...I am currently using Thwaites to good effect...

[seymour]

Bump. Just wanted to keep this thread alive. Anyone else wanna weigh in?

[zgoda]

Unfortunately the only "personality" I got from British yeast was not pleasant at all - tart aftertaste from Whitbread strain, bad fermentation behaviour of Wyeast 1028 and overly sweet finish of Wyeast 1318.

My preferred British yeast is Wyeast British Ale II, clean up to a blandness level. Definitely without any personality, but reliable and stable.

[Padalac]

So far the fullers strain. I used s04 recently and I wasn't crazy about it. Its especially problematic if you slightly over carb on a bottle conditioned beer.

[subfaction]

Fullers for me too after a recent mild I did after growing a yeast army from a Bengal lancer bottle. To be fair it's my first non-dry yeast but impressed so far with what I have seen.

[Trefoyl]

I just made Graham Wheeler's Timothy Taylor Landlord but my shop didn't have West Yorkshire yeast in stock, so I used Wyeast's Ringwood and I really like it. I left it in the primary for 4 weeks at 70 f. then transferred to keg and force carbed. It's in the garage now where the temp is around 50 f. and the character is continuing to develop. After about 3 1/2 weeks it is very fruity. I think it tastes amazing.
A brewpub about an hour north of me http://www.britishbrewpub.com/ uses Ringwood in their Peter Austin built brewery, and I really like their beer.
My homebrew store owner hates Ringwood though and I've heard opinions are very polarized.

I think I will be sticking with Wyeast in general, I'm always happy with the results.

[seymour]

Sounds great, Trefoyl. I've heard the Ringwood strain requires (or at least benefits from) periodic rousing. Did you have to disturb it or stir it or anything to keep attenuation going?

[Trefoyl]

No, I just let it sit. Fermentation took about 4-5 days like normal then slowed. There was an occasional bloop through the airlock for over 3 weeks. It seems nicely attenuated but I didn't take a final gravity.
Once, when using a yeast I don't recall the name of that recommended rousing, I simply rocked and swirled the carboy gently and that seemed to get things going again. There didn't seem to be any need for rousing this time, I was content to let it finish slowly because I figured that the extended time in the primary would clear up the diacetyl people seem to complain about, but it's still not a tame yeast. To borrow a phrase from Alton Brown, "It brings a lot to the party." The hop bitterness was much more apparent when first kegged, but the fruitiness has definitely softened it quite a bit.

[Hogarth]

Best beers I ever made were using Hopback yeast cultivated from bottles of Summer Lightning. It gives you a lovely soft, creamy beer.

[seymour]

bump.