Mangrove Jacks M54 Lager yeast

GFHomebrew

Well-Known Member
Premium Member
Established Member
Joined
Mar 30, 2016
Messages
16,493
Reaction score
25,552
Points
113
Location
Palmwoods QLD
Gday all
There have been some threads circulating recently where the term "steam Lagers" has been used. New to the Lager side of brewing as I suppose most Brewers story is I started out brewing with Ale yeast and haven't delved into the secret ancient art of all things Lagering. Now I was on my local homebrew site checking for any clearence stock as the cheap arse myself is want to do. Well of course I ended up browsing the yeast selection from Mangrove Jacks dry yeasts and I Stumbled upon Mangrove Jacks M54 Californian Lager yeasts and the yeast characteristics caught my attention below is the specks on the yeast.

Question has anyone else brewed with this yeast before what was your thoughts on it how has it compared to other dry lager yeast strains and did you ferment at ale temps and produce a clean crisp lager like beer?
I love to take short cuts if I don't need to chill to lager temps to pitch if I don't need to ferment a lager temps and if I don't need to do any extended Lagering IM IN. :p.

A unique lager strain that has the ability to ferment at ale temperatures without the associated off flavours. Extended lagering periods are also not required.

Aroma Characteristics:
California lager yeast produces a clean lager aroma without the associated sulphur this yeast is perfect for most kinds of lager.

Flavour/Mouthfeel Characteristics:
California lager yeast produces clean and crisp lagers, this yeast is excellent for producing anything from a hoppy pilsner to a helles allowing excellent malt and hop character to be expressed.

Higher Alcohol Beers:
With a medium alcohol tolerance this yeast is not designed for fermenting over 8.5%.

Suitable for California Common and lagers fermented at ambient (ale) temperatures.

Net weight: 10g sachet
 
I ended up grabbing some at my home brew store this arvo. I guess I'll,have to trial this yeast on a pils or Kolsch and get back to you all on it.
 
Ok well brew is in keg now from using this lager yeast. Attenuation ended up 80%so not too bad! It sure does smell fruity that's whet the test flasks smell. It came out plenty cloudy I've added gelatin to help drop it I'm not sure if this is a poor floculation thing or something to do with my brewing;) I'm still 50/50 with this so far. The recipe is a pretty basic one mostly Pilsner so if there are any flaws I'm going to find out when it is ready to drink:).
 
Ive had a beer using that yeast in for 7 days so far moved it to room temp, bubbling has stopped but still has pressure, will check it out in 3 days
 
Ive had a beer using that yeast in for 7 days so far moved it to room temp, bubbling has stopped but still has pressure, will check it out in 3 days
Recipe I used was steam L2 OG=1.052 - FG=1.010. Primary fermentation was 7 days I kegged yesterday and brew log said day 12. The wort going in was a beautiful straw colour but it was pretty cloudy yesterday but I'm hoping gelitin and some cold keg storage for two weeks will drop most of this.

I fermented at 18c for 4 days then slowly raised to 20c to Finnish then dropped it back to 18 then down to 8 for last day or two before Kegging. Will pour a glass next week and post a pick I'll throw up a shot of my test tube prior to pitching yeast you'll like it. Cheers and good luck!
 

Attachments

  • image.jpeg
    image.jpeg
    531.2 KB · Views: 899
Just a quick process comment, when you lower your primary back down after diacetyl rest; have you considered fining he beer there instead of in the keg ? Then transfer the cleared brew to keg for further conditioning.
 
Just a quick process comment, when you lower your primary back down after diacetyl rest; have you considered fining he beer there instead of in the keg ? Then transfer the cleared brew to keg for further conditioning.
Yep I did this with this brew but my wine fridge goes to 8c i hear gelatin works by dropping the haze as it forms as brew chills I added gelatin the morning before I kegged but didn't add any to keg so will see. my last few beers I've gelatined in keg and after week two it's pretty clear. I'm hoping this brew clears to same as in test tube as I loved that colour time will tell Llewellyn my father is a welsh man makes me half mad and half welsh ha ha!

And on the side I hear most Welshman love there beer!:D
 
My gelatin program is a brulosophers yep I mirror him:oops:. Half a teaspoon to half a cup 80c water. I boil my kettle wait a while the pour into my gelatin in measuring cup. Just thought it would be a good indicator as I know there are a few different gelatin mixes cheers:)
 
Llewellyn my father is a welsh man makes me half mad and half welsh ha ha!

And on the side I hear most Welshman love there beer!:D
Lol well I got the brown hair but a ginger beard :D so I think that qualifies me as a bit over 50% mad ....and we do love beer hahaha
 
ok this didn't come out right, way too sweet, not sure if it was the yeast or not, Ive never used it before so Im guessing thats it, final gravity was 12 ish, I was going for 10 but yeast was done, no hop presence at all which was my goal but it should have balance out the bitterness, debating on how to fix this roasted soda water hmmm
 
Yea its attenuation is a bit poor. Sounds like it's not a clean fermenting yeast I could smell fruity from this yeast will taste my brew this weekend and post a pick. You ever made a hop tea Ozark? Aussie no chill dude youse em for aroma and flavour,in no chill brews you do a short mini boil of hops in water or saved wort on stove for 10 mins cool then decant this into your brew maybe that could be an option if you need bitterness boil for longer utilisation isn't great but it might get you outta trouble with this one;)
 
just a recap I over carbed this on purpose and did some digging through notes, the extra sweetness cane from 3 places, the Golden promise mixed with Amarillo hops mixed with a slightly under attenuation, little things add up and "my" too sweet was perfect for someone else so i guess Ill leave it, its growing on me now as it ages
 
Well the verdict is in here is this M54 Pilsn lager style beer. It's only young 7 days in keg but In my opinion so far behind the 8 ball that it's got a lot of catching up to do or I'll be ousting the yeast and never using mangrove jacks again! Fermentis yeast are so much more reliable in my book you can almost guarantee that you'll get a relatively clean brew out of it. The yeast attenuation was around 80 not bad at all it had a slight Sulfur smell early on in fermentation but I couldnt quite gauge fermentation activity becaus of an air lock problem I just had a slight air leak somewhere. These new three piece senior air lock crack soooo easy it's ridiculous I give em a good swill around fermentor with the star San and they come out split! As to the beer it's hazy but young it will clear more. Head is almost non existent it struggles to keep one I have to give it a good rouse to get one up:oops::p. Taste wise it's rough not clean like yeast is yet to drop or something just nothing like a lager taste should be. Aroma where is the Sazz I dry hopped with nope nowhere it's not nice! I'm thinking shisht have I got an infection! This has got me whipped into a frenzy tonight I'm spinning up a starter of wlp090 pronto to get my next brew on the charge for tomorrow as my L1 Lager kicked this morning and I'm staring down the barrel of beautiful vanilla cream ale and stinky M54 cal common stink lager:eek:. Yea cream ale mmmmm yes please but this one I'm puzzled I'll leave it a week more pour off a sample and go from there. Huge let down with M54 :(
 

Attachments

  • image.jpeg
    image.jpeg
    287.5 KB · Views: 937
Im doing a starter with m54 right now and after 12 hours I still have an inch of foam on top, im thinking this should be treated more like a lager yeast than an ale, its very slow
 

Back
Top