Brewer Mag Yeast Q&A: Kveik Strains

BREWER: What is your background on using Kveik strains? Where did you hear about it?
Kveik is a pretty special, fun, fruity and unique yeast that seems to be making the rounds right now. We first heard about it from some of our brewing friends at Milk The Funk. Word on the street was that Kveik yeast worked backward to just about any yeast out there in that you pitch much less yeast than normal, pitch it warm, ferment hot, like up to 100​ degrees​ or higher, it works fast. Normal yeast at that temperature would produce highly phenolic beer, and apparently Kveik does not produce phenolics. This is particularly attractive for brewers who might have difficulty controlling fermentation temperature and pitching enough yeast. – Tim Thomssen, Boiler Brewing Co., Lincoln, Nebraska

​BREWER: ​What process did you use in creating your beer to use with Kveik?
​I used only my ​HLT and ​m​ash ​tun in the brew process. ​I​ infused my sparge water with the juniper and used traditional grains. Then what ​I​ did different was ​I​ pulled some of the wort at about 30 minutes into the mash to use to boil some hops on a​n​ induction burner for 45 minutes then added that back to the mash before mashing out. ​S​ince then, ​I​ have use the Hornindal Kveik yeast in a few of our other brews with ​g​reat results. I love the yeast! It is a beast! It has great benefits, it works a higher temps without producing the off flavors you would normally get with high temp fermentation. That in turn saves us money and time with ​k​nock d​​own, fermentation and not to mention its finishes very quickly so we have faster turns on our tanks. – Trevor Luther, Grove City Brewing, Grove City, Ohio

​BREWER: How do you feel you can improve upon what you have made with it so far?
For an IPA I might not use the Arset strain again as we noticed some​ ​light cider qualities to the aroma that were out of place in an IPA and​ ​worked well in a kettle sour. We will likely try the Voss strain in the​ ​future for an IPA. – Ryan Murphy, Mustang Sally Brewing, Chantilly, V​irginia​​

​BREWER: What has the general consumer reaction been?
Putting it up there in the context of a juicy IPA, that’s helpful right now because people are interested in those beers. You put those beers up on your board and people are going to order them anyway. There is an intimidation factor without the beer that it was in our case. Because it was part of a juicy IPA, people were definitely interested. – Andy Farrell, Bell’s Brewery, Kalamazoo, Michigan

​BREWER: Do you see this as a sustainable yeast strain for multiple uses or more of an outlier/fun thing to try?
I absolutely see this yeast being a sustainable strain to use, especially with the rise and popularity of the new IPA trends; tropical fruit forward hops, that marry well with this yeast strain. – Shane Cummings, Commonhouse Aleworks, North Charleston, South Carolina

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