Years First Mild

It’s slowly starting to feel like autumn. Last night I tapped the first corny of Mild for the year. Primed with dark sugar this batch of Masons Mild is exceptionally rummy and fruity with good body and mouth feel for a 3.5% beer. I knew that a mild would be a real test for the US-05 yeast. With a low gravity demanding some fruit esters to give it interest common opinion was the US-05 would be to clean and simple.

On the contrary, I have found the yeast to give my ales a distinctive honey ester and while the dark sugar is no doubt contributing the rummy character to the Mason’s I suspect the berry and dried fruit notes are from the yeast. So far so good.

A Religious Conversion

After years of using the Saf-04 English ale yeast, a dried twin of a Whitbread strain, I have decided to make a change. This is reasonably significant as I have always been an avid and vocal supporter of the strain. Recently however I have been finding that particularly when dealing with low gravity beers the yeast has been producing a lot of diacetyl, in addition a few people both pro and amateur brewers have been remarking that Saf-04, or 1099 its liquid twin, seem to hide hop aroma. My silver medal winning IPA was brewed with Saf 05, the dried version of 1056 which traces its history to the English Nottingham strain via the Ballantine Brewery and Sierra Nevada Brewery in the US. I’m going to use this strain for awhile and see how my beers fare. Today I’m brewing the first batch of Berhampore Best Bitter with the new yeast.

Just to be clear, I’m still firmly in the dried yeast camp. If you really needed proof that you can brew fantastic beer with dried yeast you need look no further than Barry Hannah, Brewer of the Year at the SOBA Homebrew Championships and runner up for Best in Show with his unanimous gold medal Mild. Barry only uses dried yeast.