Has anyone tried fermenting Wyeast 2308 at ale temperatures? I’m thinking of pitching at 64F and slowly ramping to 70F at 50% attenuation.
I haven’t used it warm like this, but I imagine it will turn out pretty good. I would keep at 64 F the whole time and only bring up to 70 F if you detect any diacetyl, otherwise keep it down at 64 F which is plenty warm for this yeast.
I see no issues with this, unless you are actually trying to make a clean lager. I make ales with lager yeasts at ale-like temps quite often, but fermenting at higher temperatures will most likely create some esters that would be inappropriate in a lager.
I got the idea of fermenting lagers this way from Marshall’s write up at Brülosophy. He strongly claims that lagers can be made at ale temperatures. I thought I would give it a try. He frequently uses 34-70 which I’ve used at ale temps successfully.
I haven’t read any accounts of 2308 being used for lagers in the 60s.
It is certainly worth some experimentation in my opinion. I’m of the current view that it’s likely that lager strains don’t produce as much esters warm as originally thought. Not unless you use them downright hot >70 F or in that neighborhood probably. But at 64 F? Naw, I don’t think so. But I haven’t run many experiments yet to know for sure. The only lager yeast I’ve used around that temperature was S-189 and it turned out excellent.
I think I’ll split this into two fermenters and compare for myself.
My garage’s temperature is 45-50 this time of year and providing a little heat to get to the low 60s for the test batch is no problem.
Saying “lagers can be made at ale temps” is a bit of a sweeping statement and over generalization IMO. Sometimes they certainly can, others it doesn’t work so well. I’ve only ever used 2308 at lager temps, but I suspect that it would make a decent beer at ale temps.
I’ve read about 34/70 fermenting warm but not -189. Interesting.