selecting a yeast strain

[Raptor99]

Ah, but how many have expired, lol?

I have kept yeast for 1-2 years past the expiration date in the fridge and they have worked fine. If the yeast is old, I pitch more. If you really want to keep it longer, put it in the freezer!

 

[Ted Brumleve]

I find it interesting that my Walker's LaCrescent white wine with QA23 cleared much faster than same vintage made with D47.

 

[Jovimaple]

I find it interesting that my Walker's LaCrescent white wine with QA23 cleared much faster than same vintage made with D47.

Yeast gonna do what yeast gonna do.

 

[vinny]

Yeast gonna do what yeast gonna do.

I see it so clearly, now!

 

[vinny]

I have kept yeast for 1-2 years past the expiration date in the fridge and they have worked fine. If the yeast is old, I pitch more. If you really want to keep it longer, put it in the freezer!

I keep it all in the freezer. The bread yeast bricks I am using as nutrient are 5 years past expiration and they are Juuuussst getting noticably slow. The freezer is definitely the way to store long term.

 

[Raptor99]

I should add that I almost always make a yeast starter rather than dry pitching the yeast. At a minimum I rehydrate with Go Ferm. If the yeast is older or the fermentation conditions are difficult (e.g. cranberry). I add some must to the hydrated yeast in stages to acclimate the yeast to the conditions. One advantage of making a yeast starter is that you find out whether your yeast is good without having to wait 1-2 days, and potentially giving spoilage organisms a change to grow.

 

[Rice_Guy]

I made a lingonberry wine in 2021 that I never liked because it had an off-odor. I didn't add any extra yeast nutrient besides what I mixed in at the beginning and I'm now wondering, 2 yrs later, if that is what contributed to the off-odor.
I started a new batch this week using the same brand of lingonberry syrup and the same recipe, but this time I researched the yeast and used K1-V1116, and so far everything smells delicious, more like cranberry and with no off-odor. Is it the yeast?

Low YAN correlates with reductive flavor. ,,, Loss of fruity aromatics. ,,, Production of Sulfur based compounds derived from H2S, sometimes called skunk or hair perm or cooked meat.

Yeast are ranked based on are they low, medium or high nutrient selections. YES it could be the yeast selection, but at the same time given proper nutrition it wouldn’t have mattered. Winemaker Magazine November 2022 in “Who’s Fault Was It?” ranked reductive flavor as the second most common problem. Partly due to that I am favoring Renaissance NO H2S yeast.

Can you describe what that off odor in 2021 was?

 

[Jovimaple]

Can you describe what that off odor in 2021 was?

If memory serves, it was a touch of sulfur.

Edited to add that I take it back. The batch of lingonberry I have going now is almost done fermenting. While I couldn't smell it before, I can now smell the same "aftertaste/aftersmell" I could in the previous batch. And I also remembered that I could taste it in a lingonberry wine that was made by an award winning winemaker in Iowa. So I am back to believing it truly is just the way lingonberries taste. It's almost like a cranberry, but there's this after taste that I don't like.