Fermentis T-58 Yeast

http://www.fermentis.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/SFBT58.pdf

I've found two sachets of this in my rather large yeast packet pile in the top of the fridge. They seem to almost deliberately shy away from using the word 'Belgian' but from all the write ups I've found on American forums it sounds very much like a Belgian yeast. Has anyone used it? I was thinking about a Belgian Blond / Golden Strong at some point, would this yeast work or should I plan something else for it?

Yes you'll get the sort of esters you'd expect from something like a wheat beer. The beeri used it on was fairly low abv so it might be more Belgian flavoured at higher alcohol levels. Mine was a little too strong on the esters for my tastes but I did ferment at the upper limit of it's temperature. Worth a go for something strong, I reckon.

T-58 seems popular at the moment. The following was my answer on another forum earlier today...


Used it a couple of times for dark, strong, "Belgium" styles. "Estery" is a way of putting it. Quite a sweetish flavour that I couldn't put a named fruit to ("pineapple" was one attempt, certainly none of the usual suspects of bananas, cloves, etc.). Distinct, pleasant (...ish), very slightly uncomforting flavour (i.e. "do I like it?" or "do I not like it?). Certainly needs time (6 months minimum?).

I'm not even sure I want to give it another try. But it has on both occasions produced good beer, I just might have expected better. It has been encouraging me to try liquid yeasts (haven't done yet though).

But it isn't as screwy as their "Abbaye" (BE-256) yeast!

I've used this yeast twice, my first two AGs, and I don't like either beer. The first time was on a Belgian Triple and it fermented too hot (pitched at 25C but it rose to 27C during fermentation), so I only have myself to blame. The second time was on a Dubble and it fermented at the top of its range (pitched at 20C but it raised to 23C during fermentation). They were both strong (10% and 9%), and have both been conditioning for over a year. I tried them again last week and no substantial improvement. They are drinkable, just, if I'm in the right mood, but definitely two of the three brews I'd describe as failures. I'll probably let them condition for another year or two, if only because I can't be bothered opening and cleaning the bottles, but I have a feeling they'll be going down the drain. Other people report success though, so I don't mean to put you off as much as recommend that you keep the temp down. That said, I won't be using T-58 again and the next foray into Belgian styles will be with liquid yeast.

Apparently de Struise uses it and they make really good beers. I've heard De Ranke do as well.

Only used it once myself and the beer turned out decent but I'm not sure I'd use it over liquid yeasts on the market for the same styles.

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I used it once and the beer was horrible. That could of course be my incompetance.

Thanks for all the comments, which are reflective of what I've read elsewhere. I think if I do pull the trigger on this brew at some point I will use a liquid yeast.

I really liked this yeast, I've used it in a few brews.

Belgian yeast is probably some of the fussier yeast around, and where lager or American Ale yeast would be fine in some conditions, Belgian yeasts tend to go mad and throw out all sorts of flavours. T-58 seems more robust and has a lot of flavour when fermented at higher temperatures. Haven't used it in a while though as I've been trying out different yeasts for my Belgians. I've been using Belgian Hillside by Fermentum Mobile, I quite liked that too.

I've used it and have thought it was fine. I did this......


brew 11: golden haze

3kg dme
500g dwe
500g dark candi sugar
500g crystal malt
100g amarillo hops
100g galaxy hops
50g palisade hops
22 litres chase spring
500g crystal malt steeped in 2 litres water for 40 mins start temp 72 end temp 62.
added the dme,dwe and candi sugar to 4 litres chase spring added wort from crystal malt in and rinsed with 1 litre room temperature water.
boiled for 15 mins with 50g palisade hops added 3 litres room temp chase spring and 50g galaxy & 50g amarillo.
overnight no chill
Topping up to 22 litres.
Yeast used - re-hydrated T-58.
pitched at 25 deg c.
1071 og
10/10/2015
1012 fg
Primed with 135g brewing sugar 19 litres bottled

It's nowhere near as mental as their abbaye or be-256 as they now call it :lol:

I used this yeast in a belgian braggot.

For 22 L I used 1.5 kg maris otter, 400g victory, 500g vienna, 10g of Fuggles at 60 mins and another 10g at 15 mins, should work out to 10 IBUs mostly just for preservative effects. Then 1.8 kg of Asda forest honey at 0 mins. Works out to 30 gravity pts from malt and 30 from sugar.

It was also meant to get 1.5L of grape concentrate from a 4.5L wine kit to be a clone of Dogfish Head's Midas Touch / Radical Brewing's Phrygian beer and fermented with fermentis's be-256. But the mash compacted massively so I thought my efficiency might have been rubbish, the honey made it go way darker than I expected and I knocked the filter off the pump while stirring so i decided to save the wine kit in case the brew went bad. In the end I actually got 85% efficiency somehow, probably because I used 2.5kg of malt to make 21L of wort (the honey added a litre).

Mine fermented quiet cold as I have no means of controlling my fermentation temperatures at the moment, so it was probably around 16C on the LCD strip since that seems to be what most of my fermentations sit at while active.

Turned out pretty nice but odd. It's 6.3%, pale gold, carb'd to 2.5 vols so really fizzy compared to my other brews thus far. It smells fruity and tastes slightly spicy. I agree with Peebee above in that you get a sense of hmm.. do I like it or don't I? But then I also have to try and distinguish the honey character (which is tricky as forest honey doesn't taste like normal honey, it's described as malty) for the yeast character. I think it's improving with age but it's hard to tell, I did get 39 500ml bottles of it so it's gonna be around for a while. :-)

What do people mean by the abbay/be-256 being mental? That was what I was originally going to use for this beer but decided to keep it and went with the only other yeast I had with was the T-58.

By mental, I mean i escaped the fermenter, climbed up the stairs and tried to strangle me while I was asleep.

[ame]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UgfubawsrcM[/ame]

lots of headspace and a blow off valve recommended. The beer it made was good but not worth the clearing up I had to do :whistle:

Ohh... Kay... I shall be careful when I finally get round to using it. That's one energetic fermentation. :-o

Is that the only thing about the BE-256, the large kraüsen?

I got that too, while brewing a Leffe clone, after three days I transferred it from the first DJ to a second, so that I could clean up everything. However, this was one of my first brews and it showed me the positive effects of transferring to a secondary vessel. I got a good attenuation, and a very clear beer afterwards.

Bof, instead of using a too small 5 l DJ, I now use a 10 l bucket, so that I have 4 l headspace. The bucket was by the way free, I recycled it from the local fries shop (these people have nice buckets, which are certainly usable for food).

Allright, I looked at the video, impressive. I suppose that the difference between mine and yours is that mine started at OG 1.060 at most, and yours at 1.100. Looks like BE-256 has Westmalle yeast characteristics.