Lactic Acid Yeast(LAY)

[Sourz4life]

Recently me and my brewery (Mainiacal Brewing Company) have been working with Dr Bochman at Wild Pitch Yeast with yeast that create large amounts of lactic acid as well as CO2 and ethanol at the same time. Essentially allowing you to ferment and sour a beer within a months time frame without any bacteria in the mix. This is done via heterolactic fermentation. Although these strains aren't quite available to the public yet they will be soon. Here is the scientific paper on it with the PDF being free at the moment - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2017/03/27/121103

 

[mabrungard]

They are doing interesting things at Wild Pitch. They gave a talk in Indy at the AHA Big Brew day a couple of years ago. I'm curious what the acidity flavor and profile will be like in that ferment.

 

[Sourz4life]

I've used 6 of the strains, 4 of which produce enough lactic acid to bring the pH down to 3.4-3.2. While the pH is lower, its a well rounded acidity. Wickerhamomyces also has a very Brettanomyces like taste, so it makes for a pretty complex beer on its own, and that was just using basic malt builds to test it.

 

[SanPancho]

are any of these available for commercial breweries?

 

[Sourz4life]

Currently they are unavailable to Brewers in general but will be soon.

 

[owmatooth]

Are these used as adjunct yeasts, or as the primary yeast for the duration? Sounds like a nice avenue, especially with the growing popularity of sour/tart beers. What kind of fermentation temps are they running with?

 

[Sourz4life]

They are primary strains. They prefer 70-72F in fermentation but will be fine down at 68F as well.

 

[owmatooth]

let us know when they're looking for citizen volunteers to do a pre-release to the public. I'd love to give it a try, and i'm sure many sour fans on here would as well.

edit: I signed up for notifications on their website, not sure if they're into dealing directly with public, or they're more focused on commercial brewers.