Yeast for Coopers Stout

[burgo]

This will hopefully be an easy one.

I am preparing to set out on my second brew this weekend, a Coopers Stout and I can't wait. However, my last brew stuck at 1020 and in paranoid preparation I picked up a couple of 11.5g packs of Safale S-04 originally to add one if lightning strikes twice. This has got me to thinking, would it be best to start with the Safale or the Coopers 7g brewing yeast that came with the kit and what would be the advantage of doing so ? Also would you suggest activating yeast first or pitch dry ?

Thanks for any advice

[Reg]

As long as it has a long sell by date, I'd save the Safale for emergencies (like stuck ferments) or for some extract recipes later on.

Chris' excellent article on kits can be found here...

http://www.jimsbeerkit.co.uk/kits.htm

...and contains some detail on rehydrating yeast.

Otherwise you might consider investing in a yeast starter. (A spray malt solution in a milk bottle to let your yeast get started on metabolising some malt 24 hours before you pitch it! )

[Ditch]

I thought I'd picked up, somewhere on here, that the yeast supplied with Coopers Stout is Safale 4? Maybe I'm just remembering it wrong?

Anyway; I prefer to rehydrate it first. I find it's just one less niggle, to see a nice, heady yeast go in there. Just a comfort blanket

Reg; " Investing in a Yeast Starter. " ? Is this something one may buy? Sounds interesting .....

[alefric]

Whichever you use do make a starter, if nothing else it will prove the yeast just like bread making and after pitching the ferment will begin more quickly.

[Reg]

I thought I'd picked up, somewhere on here, that the yeast supplied with Coopers Stout is Safale 4? Maybe I'm just remembering it wrong?

Anyway; I prefer to rehydrate it first. I find it's just one less niggle, to see a nice, heady yeast go in there. Just a comfort blanket

Reg; " Investing in a Yeast Starter. " ? Is this something one may buy? Sounds interesting .....

Just a turn of phrase Ditch, (unless there is a market that needs cornering... ), I pretty much always use a starter on any brew from kits upwards: you can check the activity of the yeast, get it enjoying the malt conditions, and be confident your wort will face the minimun risk of airborne infection via the minimum lag time. I guess I regard the 'return' on this 'investment' as more successful brews and less head scratching when things go wrong.

Reg

[brysie]

thats interesting chris.

ive always aerated before pitching the yeast and then struggled like george bush with a doorknob, trying to make a gap to pitch the dried yeast into.
i think i was under the impression that it might damage the yeast or something.

im having a go at boingys lager with golden syrup this weekend, and so if ive got you right....

1.make up wort as per...
2.pitch yeast at the correct temp
3.wait 20 minutes
4.aerate for 5 minutes or so.
5.leave somewhere warm to ferment.

if im right, doesnt aerating cool things down too much?

[Ditch]

This is all Very interesting, indeed!

So, Chris; Can we take it you've made a Coopers Stout? On that assumption, I'd love to hear your own description of the flavour(s). I'm - as I've long since admitted on this very forum - completely useless at describing flavours in beers. I just know when I like what I'm tasting. But I couldn't even be relied upon to distinguish a 'Hoppy' from a 'Malty' brew. And Coopers Stout, to me, takes the biscuit for complexity and indescribibility of flavours.

Somewhat comparable to Coke, really; How can ye describe Coke? (Well, yeah ..... but trying to remain objective ....!) It's Just Coke, isn't it? Coopers Stout ~ to me ~ is Just Coopers Stout.

But, I'm figuring some of you really serious All Grainers could pick out the subtle clues which are just lost on me. In fact, widening the scope more; I'd be fascinated to hear how any of you guys reckon Coopers Stout could be 'improved' with such additions as an other then Medium SM, or even any of ye Crystal Malts, what ever.

An extremely subjective matter, of course. But it'd be interesting to see if any consensus emerged.

[brysie]

good question ditch man

but what may i ask tempted you away from the instructions to substitute the prescribed sugar for spraymalt?

[Ditch]

what tempted you to substitute the prescribed sugar for spraymalt?

I could just bluntly say, " Common sense ", Brysie! Simple fact is that I agree with the community consensus, around here, that using sugars will tend to result in a thinner beer. Where as SM adds more body and " Mouth Feel " (That's another thing Chris had to explain to me! Again; I always knew it, when I felt it. Just didn't have the right description for it)

Bottom line is; I'd just never think of putting sugar in a brew these days. It'd be like buying a monochrome tv set. Why? We've moved on. Things are so much better now. Now we do things differently and expect / accept a far better experience as the norm. SM gives that better experience. So, for me, it's the norm.


Chris; Maybe I should just learn that description by rote? But it'd still be just as meaningless to me See above.

Wonder if any other AG'ers will pass by, who Have tasted Coopers Stout?

[brysie]

ditch man youre a bugger.

youre not a teacher are you?
i might have to put boingys recipe on hold and brew one of those stout bad boys that you sell so well.

[THE EMBALMER]

i just sprinkled mine on top of the foam must have worked ok as i have polished it all off and is now officially my favorite beer, just wish they brewed it and sold it in pubs
jealous of all you guys that have some ready and supping will have to get some on the go soon as fv is empty

[KevP]

mine still sits in the loft, unmolested and still in its can, I have extract brews to do and doubt I'll be doing my tins for a bit.
Although saying that, I have a week off soon so may well get as many of my kits done as possible (got about 6 in waiting) to see me through lean times in the summer.

[Ditch]

Coffee and chocolate .....

Personally I find tasting notes more or less meaningless as taste is an individual thing. You either like it or you don't

I like that. " Coffee and Chocolate " are probably the first two of the myriad flavours that spring to (certainly My) mind, when trying to express Coopers Stout. Maybe that's because those are flavours I know well enough to recognise and thus put a label on?

Thus, maybe, it's my ignorance of the more subtle ingredients ~ the variously 'Kilned Malts' ~ that leads me, and anyone I hand a sample of Coopers Stout to, to squint into middle space as we try to put our finger on what our taste buds are experiencing?

I Like that too! I'll have to work out a 'schpeal' to that effect. Probably end up quite meaningless, of course. But it may give peoples minds something to latch onto as they try to fathom what's going on in their mouths. Mine too. I'll, at least, now be able to 'look for' those differences of Malt Characteristic.

Good stuff

[Ditch]

Now officially my favourite beer, just wish they brewed it and sold it in pubs

But, just imagine what it'd cost ye!

That said; I'd sooner pay through the nose for Coopers Stout, in a pub, than still pay through the nose for ~ what I only today described to someone as; " Guinness. The best option from a Vile f*cking choice! ".

Honestly, lads; You lot don't know ye born. Supermarkets offering a seemingly endless procession of (granted!) bottled beers - but at least ye getting to try 'new' things. Pubs which, if not recognised 'Real Ale' houses, at least try to present the odd choice.

Here? (And, obviously, I mean 'HERE' Dublin is 200 miles from me, and light years away in 'vibe') I have the choice of Guinness, Cider, Heiniken, Budweizer or Coors. Oh yeah; Then there's Smythwicks. Liquid sewage.

No. To be able to go down to one of my locals. Have a nice bit of grub. Wash it down with a Truly Good pint (Coopers Stout) ? ..... Nirvana!

[Reg]

You can rehydrate the yeast if you prefer but if not done carefully you can damage the yeast.

Chris, I get this bit. Maurivin's standard instructions warn of the risk of yeast shock if using their standard rehydration process.

(See: http://www.maurivinyeast.com/upload/mau ... %20514.pdf)

So, if the yeast will take without rehydration, then why not drop it straight into the wort.

However, I am a little more flummoxed by the earlier statement which is a new one on me...

Fwiw the Coopers kits mostly use the Mauri 514 strain and because dried yeast is cultured in such a way as to build into nutrient reserves it's not advisable to make a starter with it as it will just deplete these reserves.

There wont be any significant growth in a standard starter as there is already plenty of yeast in a 7g packet of Coopers yeast to ferment out 1L of 1040 wort (an typical starter size).

Assuming the yeast isn't over a year old, my advice would be to just sprinkle the packet straight onto the wort, or two packets if you can get hold of another but the ideal pitching rate for a Coopers stout would be 9g which is not as far out as most beer kits.

Do you mean that the yeast is packed along with an artifical nutrient or are you suggesting that this cerevisiae strain has some kind of built in ?glycogen? store that will be affected adversely by putting it into a nutrient environment. If it will be affected in such a way wouldn't pitching it into the main batch have the same effect?

This strain has an fermentation cycle of between three and seven days, so I'm stuggling a little bit as to the adverse effects of putting it in a starter (wort) to check its activity (as the packets in a kit will often not have a use by date) as against sprinkling it into the main batch (wort) and risking a failure if the yeast is too old.

A 24 hour period in a 1040 starter wort is highly unlikely to bring it anywhere near a state of attenuation which it cannot revive itself from whilst you get to check the activity of the yeast and naturally mutliply out the volume of the strain to well above the suggested pitching amount you mentioned.

I'd be interested to hear more on the way this strain has been produced.