I've used the D47 before but not the QA23. I do have a packet of it though. I didn't realize the QA23 had such a wide temp range. I was holding off making another batch of mead because I thought it would be too warm but I think I can keep it within QA23's temp range so maybe I'll go ahead and give another batch a try. Thinking of using it on a ginger mead with maple honey. I like these kind of experiments.
this is going to be great. I am fairly new to brewing and i get a little confused about yeast. I live way out in the boonies and have limited access to any brewing things. I bought some packages of K1 V1116 and have been happy with the results but i am looking forward to learning the differences.
I appreciate these objective tests with side by side comparison. Very informative for making your own decisions on a Mead. Aside from recipe type videos. I also appreciate that you've started muting during taste testing . Love your videos and content, but that used to be rough...lol
QA23 is a lot les finicky, and will work better most of the time, where D47 tends to be not as reliable. Also if you don't have fermenting fridge, you can forget about brewing with D47 in the summer :) Those should be included as an optional scores.
I have seen these comparison videos before, always we are going to be wanting this to be revisited down the road 1-3-6 months would be amazing content to be had!!! I'm new at using commercial grade yeast, and I often wonder what is the fastest possible time I could brew a mead in certain time windows and what a little bit of age will do for them. I have only been brewing for a year with these fancy yeast and I'm getting constant requests for mead gifts already and haven't been able to keep up demand. Its only during this pandemic where I've gotten a break and now am trying to refine my home-brewing methods.
Yeah I can't do summertime D47. I generally don't go below about 77F inside in the summertime. I'm pretty sure if my AC were set to 68, the water drainage in my AC would just fail and make a huge mess. I've gotta reserve that for the cooler months, when my apartment is at more like 70-72F (still outside the recommended range for D47, but not so much to expect a fusel-y mess).
I'm Canadian and anything above 55°F I find uncomfortably hot. I would die in your house lol. 78°F is way hotter than our hottest days in the summer were I live. I can't sleep comfortably unless my house is 45 or 50°F. And yes I realize that I'm insane.
I'm in Austin Tx using D47, I read a lot online about not going over 20c (68f) but there were also many many reports from people saying it performed admirably at 22c (72f). I've got two gallons going and they stay right about at 22c, when one looks like it's going to go over I swap it into a yetti camping cooler with cool water in it to help disperse the heat. Yeast will actually produce some heat on their own so wrapping in a towel or something like that can cause it to get warmer, but water lets the heat dissipate away from the bottle. Mind you, it's my first time, so take all of that with an appropriate dose of salt. First gallon started on the 17th and the second I started last Thursday, I'll post my results as they come in for posterity. Starting grav for both was 1.114 to 1.115 w/ 3 pounds of orange blossom honey in gallon 1 and 3 pounds of wild flower honey in gallon 2. I am very excited about this hobby and so are a lot of my friends for whom I lacked the decency to surprise with a finished product. ---update---- Gallon 1 topped out around 14% as projected. I wanted to experiment and added some bochet honey to it for "secondary" but let's face it, that definitely killed all the yeast (lawl) anywho, to be perfectly honest, I sampled it before adding the bochet honey and it was pretty damn good, a bit young & bready obviously but definitely passable. I managed to keep it below 72 F so, can confirm D47 is a little more lenient than a 20 C ceiling. I'm aging two thirds of it now and I've gone ahead and bottled the last third for personal enjoyment in these dark days.
Understandable, however it’s not always easy to get people to come on camera. Also, it’s hard to get people who are knowledgeable of mead to come on camera too haha.
I literally just bought 10 sachets of QA23 intending to use one of them to make some gewurztraminer, since none of the yeast I had on hand (including, to be honest, the yeast that came in the kit) is really suitable for that. Curious to see how this video turned out (only 15 seconds in at the moment).
Hello there, I'm very new to this meadery world and just started making my own mead not too long ago. I made some dry mead using QA23 and 1:3 honey-water mixture (by weight) and it turned out fine, then I wanted to make an even drier, more alcoholic batch, so I did by mixing QA23 in half water half honey mixture last month and have it sit in my bed room which have a temperature swing of around 24c - 31c (I live in Thailand). The fermentation went fine the first week, and then it quickly became less and less active, quicker than my first batch. Just a minute ago I decided to give it a taste, it appears to be still surprisingly sweet, and judging from my taste buds which could be wrong, the alcohol content is still around 10% while the yeast package says QA23 has 16 abv tolerence. Did I do anything wrong? Or do I need to ferment it for another month?
Hmm well, you’ll want to get a hydrometer for future reference so you can accurately measure the gravity (alcohol). I’d say if it’s super sweet your mead might have stopped early. Does it taste bad or have any weird smells?
@@ManMadeMead It does smell weird, almost like metalic smell, but the taste isn't that bad. And it's still very cloudy although the fermentation has stopped. I guess I need to get a hydrometer soon. (p.s. your channal is super duper good so please keep it up)
As a finale of this test series, a radar chart plotting out your results would be a nice way to visualize it for a quick reference.
Как же долго я этого ждал! Наконец-то появилось сравнение дрожжей! Спасибо! Жду продолжения! :)
Love that you are weighing everything! Great video, can't wait to watch the future shoot outs!
Thank you!
Great video, thank you. I find your work very helpful and time saving.
I'm happy to help!
I still feel you would be better served to have a board of judges to test your yeasts abilities.
If I can swing it in the future I will!
Love this test. Just started making meads and have only used D47 so I can't wait to try QA23. Thanks for doing these videos!
I'm glad you like them!
Love the premise here! Please keep making these shootout vids, they're super useful.
Thank you!
Heck YES!!! Revising them!!! @9:16
I've used the D47 before but not the QA23. I do have a packet of it though. I didn't realize the QA23 had such a wide temp range. I was holding off making another batch of mead because I thought it would be too warm but I think I can keep it within QA23's temp range so maybe I'll go ahead and give another batch a try. Thinking of using it on a ginger mead with maple honey. I like these kind of experiments.
Rubric, you are definitely a teacher. 🤣
this is going to be great. I am fairly new to brewing and i get a little confused about yeast. I live way out in the boonies and have limited access to any brewing things. I bought some packages of K1 V1116 and have been happy with the results but i am looking forward to learning the differences.
I'll be doing a shootout with that yeast soon so be on the lookout for that!
@@ManMadeMead Hey thats great. I will for sure watch. Thanx
I appreciate these objective tests with side by side comparison. Very informative for making your own decisions on a Mead. Aside from recipe type videos. I also appreciate that you've started muting during taste testing . Love your videos and content, but that used to be rough...lol
QA23 is a lot les finicky, and will work better most of the time, where D47 tends to be not as reliable. Also if you don't have fermenting fridge, you can forget about brewing with D47 in the summer :) Those should be included as an optional scores.
I'm trying D47 with 5 gallons of Ocean Spray grapefruit and 8 pounds of sugar. Hoping it turns out well
I have seen these comparison videos before, always we are going to be wanting this to be revisited down the road 1-3-6 months would be amazing content to be had!!! I'm new at using commercial grade yeast, and I often wonder what is the fastest possible time I could brew a mead in certain time windows and what a little bit of age will do for them. I have only been brewing for a year with these fancy yeast and I'm getting constant requests for mead gifts already and haven't been able to keep up demand. Its only during this pandemic where I've gotten a break and now am trying to refine my home-brewing methods.
....Please have some Kveik's in your shootouts!!!
I would love to see Ale yeast shoot in making mead!
Looks like it's QA23 for me. There's no way I will be keeping my house at 68 degrees. If I did, I would freeze to death. My AC stays at 78.
Yeah I can't do summertime D47. I generally don't go below about 77F inside in the summertime. I'm pretty sure if my AC were set to 68, the water drainage in my AC would just fail and make a huge mess. I've gotta reserve that for the cooler months, when my apartment is at more like 70-72F (still outside the recommended range for D47, but not so much to expect a fusel-y mess).
I'm Canadian and anything above 55°F I find uncomfortably hot. I would die in your house lol. 78°F is way hotter than our hottest days in the summer were I live. I can't sleep comfortably unless my house is 45 or 50°F. And yes I realize that I'm insane.
I'm in Austin Tx using D47, I read a lot online about not going over 20c (68f) but there were also many many reports from people saying it performed admirably at 22c (72f). I've got two gallons going and they stay right about at 22c, when one looks like it's going to go over I swap it into a yetti camping cooler with cool water in it to help disperse the heat. Yeast will actually produce some heat on their own so wrapping in a towel or something like that can cause it to get warmer, but water lets the heat dissipate away from the bottle.
Mind you, it's my first time, so take all of that with an appropriate dose of salt. First gallon started on the 17th and the second I started last Thursday, I'll post my results as they come in for posterity.
Starting grav for both was 1.114 to 1.115 w/ 3 pounds of orange blossom honey in gallon 1 and 3 pounds of wild flower honey in gallon 2. I am very excited about this hobby and so are a lot of my friends for whom I lacked the decency to surprise with a finished product.
---update----
Gallon 1 topped out around 14% as projected. I wanted to experiment and added some bochet honey to it for "secondary" but let's face it, that definitely killed all the yeast (lawl) anywho, to be perfectly honest, I sampled it before adding the bochet honey and it was pretty damn good, a bit young & bready obviously but definitely passable. I managed to keep it below 72 F so, can confirm D47 is a little more lenient than a 20 C ceiling. I'm aging two thirds of it now and I've gone ahead and bottled the last third for personal enjoyment in these dark days.
D47''s range is up to 86 degrees, not 68 degrees. It appears to have been a dyslexic moment for our video host ;)
I'm gonna try qa 23. Because my brew store had it. Lets try it out. I'm not a fan of the 47. I'd rather do 71 b
Which yeast you have ever used would you say had the most honey character.
I started my first mead this month using QA23. Im hoping it turns out
Love the ideas for the yeast shootouts, but you need at least two other judges to give this a little more legitimacy.
Understandable, however it’s not always easy to get people to come on camera. Also, it’s hard to get people who are knowledgeable of mead to come on camera too haha.
I literally just bought 10 sachets of QA23 intending to use one of them to make some gewurztraminer, since none of the yeast I had on hand (including, to be honest, the yeast that came in the kit) is really suitable for that. Curious to see how this video turned out (only 15 seconds in at the moment).
A 68 degree max temperature for D47 seemed off, so I looked it up. It's actually 86 degrees. Looks like a transposition error. Oopsie
Oh crap!
1 point out of 70? That means they’re virtually equal
Hello there, I'm very new to this meadery world and just started making my own mead not too long ago. I made some dry mead using QA23 and 1:3 honey-water mixture (by weight) and it turned out fine, then I wanted to make an even drier, more alcoholic batch, so I did by mixing QA23 in half water half honey mixture last month and have it sit in my bed room which have a temperature swing of around 24c - 31c (I live in Thailand). The fermentation went fine the first week, and then it quickly became less and less active, quicker than my first batch. Just a minute ago I decided to give it a taste, it appears to be still surprisingly sweet, and judging from my taste buds which could be wrong, the alcohol content is still around 10% while the yeast package says QA23 has 16 abv tolerence. Did I do anything wrong? Or do I need to ferment it for another month?
Hmm well, you’ll want to get a hydrometer for future reference so you can accurately measure the gravity (alcohol). I’d say if it’s super sweet your mead might have stopped early. Does it taste bad or have any weird smells?
@@ManMadeMead It does smell weird, almost like metalic smell, but the taste isn't that bad. And it's still very cloudy although the fermentation has stopped. I guess I need to get a hydrometer soon. (p.s. your channal is super duper good so please keep it up)
@@ManMadeMead Or should I change the yeast?
@@soranuttwilawann8752 You can use the same yeast!
Is there a later retasting/reevaluation video on these tests?
Once I finish a few more of these I plan on letting them age and then revisiting for another set of shootouts!
@@ManMadeMead Good deal! I look forward to continued work in this vein. Definitely have some QA23 saved in my cart for the next round of ordering.