Do Artificial Sweetners Ferment?

[numsquat]

After reading the hard lemonade thread I was wondering if Splenda or any other artificial sweetners ferment. I have various alcohol recipes, such as Sean's hard lemonade, that I would bottle if I could back sweeten w/o adding fermentables.

[Mylo]

I really doubt it. All of them are chemicals that have a perceptable sweet taste - but are not carbs. Plus, my yeast are not on diets...


Mylo

[seanhagerty]

No they arent fermentable, but be careful, a little goes a long way, and the taste isnt always what we associate with "sweet"

Before killing a whole batch, try putting a small amount in a glass full of beer and see how it goes.

Sean

[numsquat]

No they arent fermentable, but be careful, a little goes a long way, and the taste isnt always what we associate with "sweet"

Before killing a whole batch, try putting a small amount in a glass full of beer and see how it goes.

I'm going to try your recipe but need to bottle. Will do a little testing with the amounts, may even split the batch up and do different amounts of Splenda in each.

[seanhagerty]

Below is the actual recipe I used. I used 5.2 in this to try to give the yeast a chance at living through the LOW pH. It did ok.



Ingredients:
------------
Amount Item Type % or IBU
7.00 lb Lemonade Concentrate (3.0 SRM) Adjunct 58.33 %
1.00 lb Light Dry Extract (8.0 SRM) Dry Extract 8.33 %
1.00 tbsp 5.2 Stabilizer (Mash 60.0 min) Misc
1.00 tsp Yeast Nutrient (Boil 10.0 min) Misc
4.00 lb Sugar, Table (Sucrose) (1.0 SRM) Sugar 33.33 %
1 Pkgs Nottingham Yeast (Lallemand #-) Yeast-Ale


Mash Schedule: None
Total Grain Weight: 10.00 lb
----------------------------
Steep grains as desired (30-60 minutes)


Notes:
------
Added about one gal hose water to boil kettle with 5.2 and yeast nutrient added DME and sugar to boil, will let cool a bit before lemonade and water go in ferm

Used 5 lemonade concentrate, one Pink lemonade, and one limeade concentrate, topped off with hose water and one gallon of ro water.

Pitched and into brew closet.

5/27/07 fermenting nicely, citrusy aroma coming from airlock, not really what I expected, but not unpleasant.

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[Test_Engineer]

No they arent fermentable, but be careful, a little goes a long way, and the taste isnt always what we associate with "sweet"

Before killing a whole batch, try putting a small amount in a glass full of beer and see how it goes.

Sean

iirc, Splenda is maltodextrin + Sucralose.... so the Sucralose is fermentable, but obviously the maltodextrin is not.

[Mylo]

Are you sure? Sucrose is fermentable, obviously - but sucralose? They take sugar and snip off some H and O atoms and replace them with Cl. The human body doesn't have the enzymes to digest it - are you sure that yeast can? Sounds like a candidate for an experiment. The BN Army propeller heads are always up for a good experiment, aren't you?


Mylo

[numsquat]

Did an informal experiment. Have done two batches of the hard lemonade and both times pulled some extra "wort" off and added the adjusted amount of Splenda. Let it set at 68F for a week. Neither time did the FG change. So at least with the yeast already in the wort, I'm not seeing any additional fermentation with Splenda.