In the midst of making my starter last night I was curious if anyone ever mixed more than one kind of yeast together to pitch into a batch of beer.
It’s not anything that I am looking to do, just inquiring.
Let me know if this is something you guys have done.
I did it for my Oktoberfest. I had a pack of Wyeast and went to the LHBS to get another since I realized I needed 2. They were out, but had White Labs. Mixed the 2. No issue. It turned out to be one of the top 3 or so beers I’ve made. I attribute that to the nice long lagering for 10 weeks.
I’ve mixed yeasts a number of times and have never had anything but good results. I would also repitch the resulting slurries into subsequent batches. During the ferment(s) the different strains do slug it out, and after a time one of them will eventually pretty much dominate.
In any case, I’ve never experienced any downside at all to mixing yeast strains.
I remember hearing about a beer that Furthermore made called Makeweight that was fermented with an American, an English and a Belgian yeast. I was very intrigued by it and would love to try something with mixed yeast. It is on my list of things to try, once I have some sort of familiarity with lots of different yeast, and have an idea about which ones would go well together.
Professor, what kinds of yeast have you mixed together in what kinds of beer?
I like the idea of knowing the yeasts are brawling in there! Definitely going to intentionally brew something in the future with 2 yeast. Just so I can give it a cool name like Brawler IPA or Knock Out Ale.
So is there a way to know which yeast comes out the victor?
from my experiences, there’s two decent ways to get two yeast profiles in one beer. ferment half the batch with one strain, the other with another strain & blend at bottling. or ferment in primary with one strain then secondary (not bulk age) with another. the later of the two is more of a PITA. I’ve done it with big beers and had only a few stalls from multiple batches. if going with the blend method, try to use two yeasts that contradict each other but both pack the same profile punch. I’ve also had pretty good luck with two strains in primary as well. I’ve had best luck using two semi-similar strains.
