THE PROCESS IN MOTION

What is a selected yeast for?

Start the scene or choose a stage. The animation simplifies the mechanism; what follows gives the details and the available references.

▶ Play the process01One strain, in sufficient quantity02It supplants the local flora03Comparing with the control04What the strain displaces

One strain, in sufficient quantity

Instead of steering the conditions and letting the local flora arrive, a selected strain is introduced, like a baker or a brewer. Lallemand, coming from enology and brewing, launched its first yeast for coffee in 2014, Lalcafé Oro, then a range that includes Cima.

Read the stages without animation

1. One strain, in sufficient quantityInstead of steering the conditions and letting the local flora arrive, a selected strain is introduced, like a baker or a brewer. Lallemand, coming from enology and brewing, launched its first yeast for coffee in 2014, Lalcafé Oro, then a range that includes Cima.
2. It supplants the local floraIntroduced in sufficient quantity, the strain supplants the native flora and imposes its pace. The most useful study compares Saccharomyces cerevisiae CA11 and Kluyveromyces lactis B10 in the washed process, 48 hours between 20 and 24 °C, on four arabica varieties in triplicate.
3. Comparing with the controlAll scores exceed 83, the Paraíso 2 variety with CA11 exceeds 85. Of one hundred volatile compounds, two appear only in the inoculated lots: 5-methyl-2-furfuryl alcohol and n-hexadecanoic acid, absent from the spontaneous controls.
4. What the strain displacesCA11 leans toward fruity and floral, B10 toward lemongrass, citrus and honey. A spontaneous fermentation expresses the flora of a place, an inoculated fermentation a strain sold worldwide; selection of native yeasts, collected on site, reconciles the two.

To remember: Inoculating does not merely intensify what existed: two compounds appear only in the inoculated lots. Variety, medium and conditions remain decisive.

In history: The first commercial yeasts dedicated to coffee arrive in the 2010s.

Read the full article and its sources ↓

Instead of steering the conditions and letting the local flora come, a selected strain is introduced in sufficient quantity to supplant the indigenous flora and impose its kinetics, like a baker or a brewer. Lallemand, coming from enology and brewing, launched its first yeast for coffee in 2014, Lalcafé Oro, then a range that includes Cima. The most useful study compares Saccharomyces cerevisiae CA11 and Kluyveromyces lactis B10 in the wet process, 48 hours at 20-24 °C, on four arabica varieties in triplicate: all scores exceed 83, and the combination of the Paraíso 2 variety with CA11 exceeds 85; one hundred volatile compounds in thirteen classes; two compounds appear exclusively in the inoculated lots, 5-methyl-2-furfuryl alcohol and n-hexadecanoic acid, absent from the spontaneous controls.

This is not an intensification of what existed, it is the appearance of something that was not there. CA11 pulls toward fruity and floral, B10 toward lemongrass, citrus, lemon and honey. The manufacturers' argument, predictability, is sound: less variability, faster kinetics, reproducible profiles. What it shifts: a spontaneous fermentation expresses the flora of a place, an inoculated fermentation expresses a strain sold all over the world. The selection of indigenous yeasts, collected on site, is the subject of recent publications and reconciles the two requirements.

de Abreu et al., Foods 14(1):111 (2025), solid level; Lallemand, manufacturer documentation; Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry (2023) on indigenous yeasts; LC ch. 17b