One the great things about the beer community here in the South is you always meet the best people from all over the region and have an opportunity to follow some folks that are working their passion and taking things to another level entirely. One of those guys is David Thornton from SouthYeast Labs!
"Where Does Your Yeast Come From?"
SouthYeast was born out of the passion that David and his business partner have for all things chemistry; biochemistry to be exact. Attending Clemson University, the start up team looked to fill the need and niche of locally sourced brewers yeast that could be used for beer, wine, cider, mead and liquor. Yeast strains are very unique and offer a defined quality that can differentiate many producers in effect because most use the same kinds of yeast from the same manufacturers. We see this with hops as well, as the majority of hops come to brewers from HopUnion or Yakima Chief. Our local hops not unlike SouthYeast Labs local yeast strains seek to elevate and differentiate beers from their peers in the region by taking things to entirely new levels of flavor!
SouthYeast has been growing slowly throughout the last year in large part because of the time it takes to produce cultured yeast strains. The science of fermentation and how yeast interacts with the other ingredients is something that takes many brewers a long time to truly master. The rise in the last few years of "Sour" beers throughout the region has also created a huge demand for new and interesting strains that can be combined with other local ingredients like berries, honeysuckles, peaches, apples etc to create unique offerings!
Breweries, especially locally craft-centric ones, are transitioning to using more locally sourced ingredients. After all, the water used in the brewing process is typically always the most constant "local" ingredient, but now brewers are souring hops, malts and now can source regional yeast strains. Breweries can even contract with SouthYeast Labs to capture local strains to be used in the brewing process.
SouthYeast recently won 20,000 prize as the winner of the EnterPrize Awards sponsored by Clemson University and they will use the funds to expand and construct a formal research lab to further SouthYeast Labs. Currently, you can locate the yeast strains at some local shops, but be warned they sell out very fast. One such supply shop is Atlantic Brew Supply! We love Atlantic because of its focus on supporting local products as this picture will attest:
In fact, we are looking to have SouthYeast visit the Richmond area and hopefully we can arrange some visits with some of our brewers and some local farms where David Thornton can work his magic and capture some truly local strains!
The opportunities are endless here in the Central Virginia region given the large number of vegetable farms. We have wild honeysuckle and berries we would love to capture some yeast strains from for our partner breweries to use in combination with our locally grown hops.
So if your looking to take that home brew to the next level or enter that competition like the Old Dominion Cup in Richmond, Va this year tha you might want to make sure that you get some SouthYeast Labs localicious!!
The Saison yeast strains are amazing! I would go with Honeysuckle for the WIN!!
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