Omega Yeast OYL-400 Bananza™ Ale Yeast

Ripe Banana esters, with a hint of pear, makes Omega Yeast’s new exclusive strain OYL-400 Bananza™ a stand out for pastry stouts, milkshake IPAs, and other modern ales. Unlike its parental Hefeweizen strain, Bananza™ is versatile because it is non-phenolic and therefore incapable of producing clove flavors that would mask its pure banana profile.  The banana esters set the stage for tropical fruity notes in hops, complementing and amplifying their tropical characters. For more grain focused recipes stouts are a good option with their complementing chocolate notes playing with the banana character.  Specialty fruited beers are another solid choice for this strain, similar to hops, the banana esters can highlight and enhance tropical fruit flavors. 

For prime banana esters, pitch at 68°F (20°C) and let it free rise to 72-76°F (21-23°C.)

Yeast Characteristics:

• Temp Range: 66 – 75°F
• Attenuation: 73 – 77%
• Flocculation: Low
• Alcohol Tolerance: 10%
• Non-Phenolic (POF-)

Recommended styles and recipe kits to highlight Bananza’s ripe banana esters :

• NEIPA/Hazy IPA – Fruit Bazooka New England IPA
• Milkshake IPA – Hula Hop’d Coconut Milkshake IPA
• Pastry Stout – Sweet Tooth Pastry Stout
• Milk Stout – Chocolate Milk Stout
• Hefeweizen/Weissbier – Hank’s Hefe or Bavarian Hefe
• Dunkelweizen/Dunkles Weissbier – Dunkelweizen
• Fruited Specialty Beer – Funktional Fruit Sour

Get your homebrew geek on even more and try a split batch of your favorite recipe with OYL-400 Bananza™ and its phenolic parent yeast OYL-021 Hefeweizen Ale. The characteristics between the two strains are the same minus the phenolic characters, allowing you to see how the phenolic characters can mask fruity esters. Nerd out even more and try blending the two in the same batch, allowing for more control in how much spicy clove character is in your end product. Here is a list of recipe kits with Bananza’s parental strain OYL-021 Hefeweizen Ale as a recommended yeast option.

• Bavarian Hefeweizen
• Dunkelweizen
• Raspberry Wheat
• Hank’s Hefeweizen

Check out “All of the fruit, none of the phenolics!” video above where we talk with Omega founder/owner Lance Shaner and Laura Burns, director of research and development, about suggested uses for these new exciting strains Bananza and Sundew from their POF- Project. Our in-house development brewer Brad Segall also has some cool ideas of his own as he shares two beers brewed with Sundew and Bananza.