Belgian blond resembling a pea-souper

[An Ankoù]

What dried yeast would you recommend as an easier yeast for a classic Belgian Blond flavour?

Can''t help there. Living in France, it's much cheaper to culture up yeast from a bottle of Trappiste or Saison than it is to buy even a sachet. I've used Lallemand Abbey and that was cultured from the dregs of a bottle a mate sent me. I'd stick with it and ferment it warm- it has a lovely banana flavour.

 

[An Ankoù]

Can you? All beer is contaminated, by definition sanitizing only reduces microorganisms to safe levels. Every fermentation is a competition, every beer contains unwanted microorganisms, and that's why some get pasteurised to extend shelf life.

Poor yeast preparation could initially let a contamination grow and deprive the pitched yeast of essential nutrients, which could have caused poor fermentation performance in the first beer. After your pitched yeast had eventually gone through its growth (fermentation), by the act of cropping, you could have selected much healthier yeast than you started with. Especially, if you top cropped.

One beer pitched with unhealthy yeast that won't flocculate, one with healthy yeast that will.

Beer is never infected, but always contaminated.

Yes I can. I said cropped, not top cropped. In fact it was slurry. Shall i plate up a sample and see what we get? Nah, can't be 'arrised.
You do come out with some tripe, in my opinion. No we don't work under sterlle lab conditions- neither do commercial brewers.
Too little and too cold is my conclusion. The flavour profiles these yeasts produce are very much influenced by fermentation temperature.
Beware the doomsayers and enjoy your brewing, one and all.

 

[Clarence]

Beware the doomsayers and enjoy your brewing, one and all.

Ha. I'm the doomsayer around here! We're all going to roast or drown from climate change. Start building an ark, the end is nigh!
Beware indeed.

 

[Sadfield]

Yes I can. I said cropped, not top cropped.

I said, especially IF you top cropped.

if
/ɪf/

conjunction

1. 1.
   (introducing a conditional clause) on the condition or supposition that; in the event that.

 

[Sadfield]

No we don't work under sterlle lab conditions- neither do commercial brewers.
Too little and too cold is my conclusion.

Exactly, giving advantage to the organisms that are present due to that lack of sterility. Where as the second brew favoured the pitched yeast, enough yeast, correct temperature. Confirming my point rather than arguing against it. Cheers.

"They (wild yeast or bacteria) can also produce hazy beers and films. They may compete with the production strain for essential nutrients;"

The idea that contamination catastrophically ruins beer is the opposite of what I'm saying here. Low levels of contamination cause minor defects. Quite the opposite of doomsaying.

 

[Clarence]

Don't worry about Ankoù, @Sadfield , he's even grumpier than me. You should try brewing with him! I haven't tasted his dodgy blond, but I do know that when he's culturing yeast he autoclaves everything in his rickety old pressure cooker. If he's cultured up a yeast which has been ferried from one monastery to another, it's probable that the sample in the bottle wasn't as pure and godly as it could have been. Stick with CML, I say.

 

[Sadfield]

No. It's my mistake, I forget where I pick this rubbish up. A 36 hour lag time won't have led to an 'infection'.

You're right to be worried though. 72 hours is a long lag time and increased the risk of infection. Your set up looks very clean and sound, however. I'm in a panic if I haven't got a yeast cover in 24 hours, which is why I always rehydrate dry yeast or get a liquid yeast started before pitching nomatter how fresh it is.