I am getting prepped for my next brew: Honey Wheat Ale Recipe
I was reviewing the recipe and I started to think about the yeast strain that I chose. I think that the clean fermenting California yeast will be fine, but there are a couple of other strains that might be nice.
Wyeast American Wheat 1010 – This strain ferments dry and produces beers that are crisp and low in esters. Ferments in the 58° to 74° range.
White Labs WLP320 – This strain does produce some slight banana and clove flavors. It is not as clean as the 1010…but it may add some flavors to complement the honey malt. Ferments in the 65° to 69° range.
I think I am going to stick with the WLP001 but if my local homebrew shop is out of it, I may be in the market for some of these other strains.
James Golovich
If you can find the dry SafAle-05 at your shop instead of WLP001 you should be pretty happy. They are both supposed to be the chico strain.
Somewhere I heard that the Wyeast 1010 was a kolsch strain, but I can’t remember where I had heard this.
I’m not sure if its out all the time yet or if its just a seasonal strain but Wyeast Denny’s Favorite 50 (WY2450 I think) would be a great one.
Mike D
I just brewed an American Wheat yesterday using SafAle-05. It’s the 2nd time I’ve used this yeast for an American Wheat. The 1st time turned out great. A nice clean tasting brew…
Nathan
If you want a malt-forward yeast, try Wyeast 1007. It’s a German yeast that is very easy to work with. At cold temps, it is extremely clean. It can work down to 56F, but that gets into the risky area where temp control is paramount or you’ll cold crash too early. I did a wheat at 62F with this yeast. Very fast and clean fermentation, very malt foward.
Very dry, crisp, clean, nearly free of esters. At higher temps (high 60s) it starts having some fruitiness ,but nothing awful or even bad.