How important is choosing the right yeast for fruit wines?
I would say that choosing the right yeast strain for the specific style of fruit wine wanted is very important. It is often a major key in differentiating a good wine and a truly great award winning wine. Yeast is what gives “life” to a wine and often gives a particular wine its “personality” so I would say that it is very important. What are some of the strains you recommend and why? I experiment a fair amount with different strains of yeast. Over the years, I have narrowed my wine production to the following strains: Lallemand 71B – a great all around yeast for most off dry fruit wines. Really helps bring out the fresh fruitiness in most berry and some tree fruit wines. Lallemand BA11 – excellent on tree fruit and tropical fruit wines. Really helps the aroma and can increase “mouth feel”. Lallemand EC1118 – good all around yeast to use, especially with wines with low pH or starting the ferment at low temperatures. If you need the fruit wine to ferment to a very dry level, or to make
