Champagne Yeast

[ScottieP]

Hi, my first post so please be gentle.

We have a Saison which has been sitting in a whiskey barrel for 6 months plus and were about to bottle it, my boss wants to add Champagne yeast to add a little sparkle, gravity is already reading 1.009 and its dropped lovely and clear too. Im thinking champagne yeast will just take the gravity down below 1.000 and thin the beer out even more, so im keen to skip the champagne yeast and just batch prime with sugar when bottling. Any thoughts?? would this be the best way to go?

Cheers

Scott

[a10t2]

Did the fermentation stall out? If not, there won't be any sugars for the champagne yeast to metabolize.

After 6 months, I would add some freshly harvested yeast at bottling. No reason to use champagne yeast for that unless it happens to be what's on hand.

[ScottieP]

Fermentation had stalled at 1.016 before it went into the barrel, i thought champagne yeast could munch it's way through some of the sugars which brewers yeast could'nt?? no experience of using champagne yeast though just what i recall reading

[a10t2]

Fermentation had stalled at 1.016 before it went into the barrel, i thought champagne yeast could munch it's way through some of the sugars which brewers yeast could'nt?? no experience of using champagne yeast though just what i recall reading

Other way around, actually. Brewer's yeast strains can ferment maltotriose, and most wine strains can't. http://www.danstaryeast.com/articles...-yeast-strains

[dantose]

I would be hesitant about adding a new strain of yeast just before bottling. The idea behind priming sugar is that you are adding a measured amount of additional sugar for them to eat to create a specific volume of CO2. If you add a new strain with a higher attenuation, you have FAR less control over how much CO2 will be produced. That's how you get bottle bombs.

If you are adding yeast at bottling, use the same strain of yeast you fermented with.

I suspect your boss wants to give the beer a champaigne style effervescence, but that isn't a function of the yeast, but rather a function of the wort. higher protein levels will aid head retension and give it a thicker mouthfeel, lower levels will give a more soda like carbonation and thinner mouthfeel.

[KTY]

As another poster suggested, champagne yeast has been selected to ferment fructose, not maltose, and can't ferment maltotriose. So, no, it won't "munch it's way through some of the sugars" any more than any other yeast, and maybe less so. Champagne yeast is not some "super yeast", it does have a higher ABV tolerance, but it is not brettanomyces or other yeasts that can ferment sugars that normal brewers yeasts can't. It also won't give you anymore effervescence than any other yeasts, so your boss is wrong about something, too. . The only reason champagne is so bubbly is because it is carbonated to a higher volume in bottles than can handle the pressure.