The Highest Alcohol Tolerant Yeast

When it comes to the highest alcohol tolerant yeast, the question is often related to getting your ABV as high as possible in your beverage.

Now, getting a high ABV in your beverage can be done naturally, of course, with a high alcohol tolerance yeast. But it can also be done with a few tweaks and twists, playing with what is possible in chemistry and science.

Let’s discuss both.

Yeast

First, let’s talk about the process yeast undergoes in your alcoholic beverage.

We happen to think of something like yeast, especially when we think of dry active yeast in a packet, as a kind of lifeless ingredient.

But nothing could be further from the truth.

Yeast is alive and well, and eager to eat the sugar in your wort, or must or any other beverage you’re hoping to ferment.

Free Yeast Analysis for Brewers and Vintners

 

Historically, brewers, wine makers, and bakers, trusted nature to send for yeast to the food or beverage that was best suited to it.

Yeast was not something that was the harnessed, dried out, and packaged.

On the contrary, ancient Egyptians thought the production of wine from grape juice was “a miracle.”

And the invisible process of fermentation does seem like a miracle.

Up until a couple hundred years ago, anyone fermenting would simply have to have faith that wild local yeast would know what to do. And they were rarely disappointed.

For there is in fact a wide range of yeast strains. Some yeasts have lower energy needs, and therefore seek less sugar, and can tolerate less sugar, and therefore less alcohol. Other yeasts are voracious in their hunger for sugar, and will produce a much higher percentage of alcohol in your beverage.

When the process is allowed to take place naturally, a brewer or winemaker does not have to worry about alcohol tolerance, because the yeast attracted to high sugar will arrive for high sugar beverages. A yeast with a lower alcohol tolerance will be attracted to lower sugar beverages.

So while most of the yeast strains that we’re talking about here come from the parent Saccharomyces cerevisiae category, some strains are tolerant to lower sugar and alcohol levels, which brings them under the baker’s yeast category. Others have a slightly higher alcohol tolerance, making them perfect as brewer’s yeast. And still others have much higher alcohol tolerance levels, which makes them ideal for the production of wine.

Alcohol Tolerance

But of course, now that we have some level of control over the process, we want to be able to understand which yeasts are most ideally suited to which fermentation processes.

Wine Yeast

Wine yeast will have the highest alcohol tolerance, as wine typically has the highest levels of sugar, at least naturally.

Most commonly, wine is made from grapes, and not just any grapes. The grapes chosen to produce wine are naturally much sweeter than table grapes and come with a much higher sugar concentration.

The yeast that we use in wine must then have a voracious appetite for sugar and be able to tolerate higher alcohol levels that the yeast itself produces.

In general, wine ABV can claim as high as 18%, so wine makers need yeast that can bear that fermentation process. A yeast with a lower tolerance will begin to die off as alcohol levels climb, leaving stagnant, dead yeast in the liquid, and a much higher sugar content than the winemaker desires.

Again, in nature, this would never happen. Only yeast attracted to high levels of sugar will ferment wine. And in the natural course of events, the yeast does not die as it produces the alcohol. As alcohol levels climb, the sugar naturally runs out, and the yeast merely lies dormant, awaiting its next bout of sugar consumption.

Winemakers, wishing to control the process, must seek out a yeast with a higher alcohol tolerance if they wish to purchase it commercially.

Brewer’s Yeast

Brewing is a kind of sweet spot between wine and bread.

The yeast that will ferment beer does not need to have a super high alcohol tolerance as most beers average between 6 and 8%.

But it does need to have a higher alcohol tolerance, than say baker’s yeast, which typically produces closer to 1 to 2% ABV.

Grain is not naturally high in fermentable sugars, and even roasted, does not produce near the sugar levels that grape juice/wine must will.

Baker’s Yeast

Which brings us finally to baker’s yeast.

Much of the grain used to make bread is not roasted or toasted, melted, or kilned.

Thus, the sugars in bread dough are very low, just enough to attract yeast that will gently ferment, allowing for a gentle rise, and producing a light and fluffy bread. The alcohol will then burn off in the oven.

Highest Alcohol Tolerant Yeast

As such, the highest alcohol tolerance yeast is going to be wine yeast. Wine yeast is known for having a strong attraction to high sugar beverages, and you can rely on them to continue producing alcohol all the way up to even 25%.

One of the highest, if not the highest, alcohol tolerance yeast on the market today is called turbo yeast. It is a special type of yeast that yields ABV levels up to 25% in a very short time.

There are several varieties of turbo yeast, including 24 hour turbo yeast, 48 hour turbo yeast, vodka turbo yeast, rum turbo yeast, whiskey turbo yeast, classic 8 turbo yeast, heat wave turbo yeast, pure pot still turbo yeast, triple distilled turbo yeast, and express turbo yeast.

Remember that the trick to working with high alcohol tolerance yeast is to provide enough sugar for the yeast so that it does not stagnate.

And if you’re using a lower alcohol tolerance yeast, be sure not to provide too much sugar, which will essentially trigger your yeast to overproduce alcohol, get stressed out, and die.

Cheers!

Are you still pitching fresh yeast every time? By reusing your yeast, you can save up to hundreds of thousands of dollars per year on just yeast alone!

Join the hundreds of brewers and vintners from all around the world using the smartest Automated Yeast Cell Counter! Request a Free Demo Account today and experience firsthand how Oculyze can take your brewery or winery to the next level! 

 


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