Putting yeast back in suspension what do you think

[terrenum]

Hey fellow brewers

I've been brewing beer fro 7-8 years and experienced quite a it with LAB and Brett and so on.

I have a question for more experienced brewers. Coming from the wine world and having produced wine in California and France, there is a technique called batonnage that you could do while aging white wines. You mostly see this on Chardonnay but could be done on other varietals as well. In a nutshell, you agitate the must and put the yeasts that have settled at the bottome in suspension. This add complexity, yeasts aromas and mostly body to the wine.

Is this a technique that coud be applied on beer? For instance, would you put the yeasts back in suspension after 7-10 days in primary? Would this add texture to the finish beer? Help cleaning up the bi-product from fermentation or affect the flavour profile in any way?

Let me know if you have tested this or what is your feeling about this
regards

 

[terrenum]

no one has learnings / expertise to share?

 

[beermanpete]

I believe this is done for certain beer styles and is called "rousing" in the beer vernacular. The purpose to do this with beer is to improve attenuation as I understand it.

 

[day_trippr]

From http://www.winespectator.com/drvinny/show/id/52755

Bâtonnage is the French term for stirring settled lees back into wine. To remind you, “lees” are the sediment of winemaking, usually made up of dead yeast and bits of grape seeds and solids. Winemakers sometimes like to keep some of these solids in contact with the wine as a way to extract flavor, aroma and texture. The solids can then be filtered or fined out before bottling, or the wine can be racked, leaving the solids behind.

As you might imagine, if left alone, these solids will settle to the bottom of a barrel, which can be bad. If the lees are left undisturbed, they run the risk of stinky hydrogen sulfide forming. Bâtonnage helps prevent this, as well as extract some of the texture and complexity the lees can offer. Just like when I put sugar in my coffee, it’s a good idea to stir that sugar in, instead of just letting it sit on the bottom.

So it appears this technique has little if anything to do with yeast.

"Rousing" is a technique used to re-suspend flocculated yeast in the hopes of shaving a point or three off final gravity.
I suspect any actual benefit it conveys is with yeast that are heavy/early flocculators.
The only time I've ever tried rousing was with a elephantine barley wine (didn't have any effect)...

Cheers!

 

[Yooper]

Most wine strains create lees with not flavorable flavors. There are a couple that are ok, and can provide a depth of flavor, but the strain needs to be chosen carefully. Most wine lees don't taste good, and leaving the wine on the lees, stirring or not, will create off flavors.

Since beer isn't generally dosed with sulfites like wine is to avoid oxidation, and stirring can oxidize the wine, and I don't know of a single beer yeast strain that imparts good flavors during autolysis, I would be suspect of anybody who would say that doing this is a good idea.

 

[terrenum]

Thanks. My feeing about this is it would add complexity or mouthfeel to a beer but could help improve fermentation if it is stuck or for high gravity beer.
Thanks