Coopers Kit Saflager Yeast

[Jawaman]

After reading this forum for the last couple of months I'm finnaly ready to ask my first questions. After four months of brewing ales I took the next step forward, bought a fridgmate and confiscated wifes chest freezer in the name of science and art. About a month ago I found a Coopers European Lager on special for $10 and decided to use it as a base for my first lager. At the end I decided on 1.5 kg of black rock LME with 20grms of Saaz @ 20 min and 20 grms of Saaz at flame out (steeped for 20 min), used cooled boiled cooled water topped up to 23L and added 200gm of dextrose. I decided against the kit yeast and pitched in Saf-23 at 20 C, over the next couple of days brought temp to 9 C. At the moment its brewing nicely, I'm plannig to give it a diyacetil rest then rack and dry hop with 10 grm of Saaz. Now the big question is I have still the original Coopers "presumably" saflager yeast in a 7 grm bag. I would like to use it in the future. Has anyone has more info on this yeast? Is 7 grm going to be enough to ferment a new 23L batch? After it has been sitting on the shelf (I've put it in the fridge for now) I plan to do a yeast starter to see if it fires up but would like to find out a touch more about this yeast strain.

PS: I've been born and bred in the Pilsner Urqell country, its been a while since I tasted the original unpasteruised gold liquid compared to what we get here, but my hollygrail has just began for the down under version. Thanks for your help, this forum is a definite gold mine.

[Chris]

http://www.fermentis.com/fo/pdf/HB/EN/S ... -23_HB.pdf

It is a pdf, but it contains all one needs to know about s23.

[Jawaman]

Thanks for the info... that's why I have gonne for the saf-23 but what about the coopers lager yeast. Is it basicaly saf-23? And why they give you 7 gms when you would pitch at least 11.5? In their instructions they recommend to keep the temp between 11C - 18C, saf-23 optimal temp is 11C - 15C but to pitch 7 gms compared to 11.5 gms of saf-23 seems a con to me unless the coopers lagers yeast has some ale yeast in to make sure you get a fast multiplication of yeast during higher pitching temp. to make sure that 7gms will handle 23l of wort....

[Chris]

As far as I know, the Coopers Euro is a saf-23.

As for the higher temperatures that Coopers recommends...

Firstly, they want it to take less time- it's all about marketing.

Secondly, they want to make it sound easy- it's all about marketing.

As for the 7g packet, they want to cut costs- it's all about profit.

[drsmurto]

The response i got from coopers on the contents of various kit yeasts suggested to me that its mostly their own strains which are blended to be able to ferment over their recommended temp range - hence, i am a little dubious over the claims they include a Saf yeast in their kits.

If it was me, i would use the yeast as food for a known strain of yeast.

[Chris]

I completely agree with that last point.

I know the Coopers Bav lager was saf-23 exclusively. I just assumed its replacement might be too.