Mixing yeast?

[Bobcatbrewing42]

I have had more than one occasion where I considered mixing yeast strains. Right now I have two carboys full of Red Roggenbier (rye) pitched with Safale 05 and a third one pitched with Nottingham. One of the Safale and the Notty a have a nice ferment going with a healthy krausen and one is barely starting. Maybe the package was weak or maybe it was because I neglected to pour out a few ounces of Starsan before I started siphoning from the boil kettle. I have more saved Nottingham that I could use to repitch.
Additionally- can you mix yeasts to try to get some of the best attributes of the two? Would a fast starting yeast overwhelm the slower one.

 

[trentm]

I have had more than one occasion where I considered mixing yeast strains. Right now I have two carboys full of Red Roggenbier (rye) pitched with Safale 05 and a third one pitched with Nottingham. One of the Safale and the Notty a have a nice ferment going with a healthy krausen and one is barely starting. Maybe the package was weak or maybe it was because I neglected to pour out a few ounces of Starsan before I started siphoning from the boil kettle. I have more saved Nottingham that I could use to repitch.
Additionally- can you mix yeasts to try to get some of the best attributes of the two? Would a fast starting yeast overwhelm the slower one.

Yes you can mix yeast strains. Results could vary. For my Saison I commonly mix a isolate saved from Orval (available as WLP510) with an isolate I have from Moinette. I feel these strains complement each other well and have similar growth rates so they compete well with each other.

I'm not really sure the effects of a fast growing strain mixed with a slower one. However, in some cases a slower growing strain may finish stronger. In addition, I am not in the camp that says most of the flavors are developed at the beginning of fermentation, however, their precursors may be.

 

[Bobcatbrewing42]

OK. Thanks. My yeast is slowly picking up steam. I wonder if the excess Star San reduced the yeast count and the surviving yeast is finally multiplying. I am assuming that the chemical reactions of the Star San acids in the wort are using up the active potential on those acids. From what I remember of chemistry, something like that reaches a state of equilibrium at some point. Of course that leaves a question of what the resulting compounds might be and what the beer would tast like. I considered dissolving some PBW into some water and adding it to the wort to neutralize the star san acids (mostly phosphoric) but then I would have a little of some kind of salt in the beer. This will be interesting. I'm betting that this will be OK, based on what John Palmer says about Star San not affecting the taste of beer.

 

[AerationStation]

1) I wouldn't suggest ingesting PBW, don't put it in your beer

2) A couple of ounces of Star San is no big deal for a 5 gallon batch. The acid breaks down in to phosphates in the wort, which will actually help the yeast along (there's a Brew Strong episode about sanitizing on the Brewing Network where the Five Star guy talks about it)