Liquid Yeast

[Steve]

Just curious if anyone has used liquid yeast in their winemaking? If so would you recommend it?

 

[Curt]

Steve,


The only liquid yeast that I've used is the Wyeast sake yeast in their "whack pack". I used plain old 1118 on one batch and it turned out really good, very different but really good. The Wyeast worked as advertised. You do have to do a little more planning though because it takes 6-12 hours for it to be ready to use after you rupture the little inside packet of yeast and shake it into the surrounding nurtient soup. You have a dynamite yeast colony when it's ready though.

 

[dfwwino]

I have used White Labs Sweet Mead Yeast to make fruit wines on a number of occasions and have had excellent results. I think it does a better job on fruit wines than dry yeasts. However, I am also a cheap (i.e., tightwad), so I don't use liquid yeasts for most of my wines as the difference is not that significant. A tube of White Labs will run $5 to $7, depending on the vendor. You just can't beat a packet of dry yeast for under a dollar. In contrast, I think liquid yeast makes a huge difference in beermaking, although recently some Safale dry yeasts have been released for beer making that contain less impurities. Dry yeast always will have some impurities and wild yeasts unlike liquid yeasts. Unlike Wyeast smack packs, a tube of White Labs can be immediately pitched after giving it chance to warm to room temperature once removed from the refrigerator. Edited by: dfwwino