What Is the Difference Between Instant and Regular Yeast?
"Yeast" refers to a family of naturally-occurring, single-celled fungi commonly used as an ingredient in baking, brewing, and winemaking. Baker's yeast is a cultivated strain of the species Saccaromyces cerevisiae and is commercially available in fresh, dry, and instant forms. As a leavening agent, baker's yeast creates the sponginess in bread and pastry doughs, making them light and airy when baked. Does this Spark an idea?
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Function
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Yeast ferments the sugars and starch in flour and produces carbon dioxide and ethanol. The carbon dioxide gas gets trapped as bubbles in the dough, which "rises" or expands as a result. After the dough is baked, these bubbles create the familiar spongy texture of leavened baked goods.
Types
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The three types of baker's yeast sold in grocery stores for home baking are: active fresh, active dry, and instant. Active fresh yeast is also known as compressed or cake yeast. Active dry, or simply dry yeast, is the type of baker's yeast most commonly called for in recipes. Instant yeast is also known as rapid rise, quick, or fast-rising yeast.
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Features
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Active fresh yeast is typically sold as 0.6-ounce or 2-ounce foil-wrapped, slightly moist cakes that must be softened with lukewarm liquid (70 to 80 F) before used as an ingredient. Active dry yeast is typically sold as 0.25-ounce packets of dry, powdered yeast which must be activated prior to being used as an ingredient by adding warm water (105 to 115 F) and letting it sit until it begins to foam. Instant yeast is packaged similarly to active dry yeast but can be added directly to dough as a dry ingredient.
Considerations
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Active fresh yeast imparts the most flavor to baked goods, but it has a relatively short shelf life of just a few weeks. Active dry and instant yeasts have much longer shelf lives of approximately four months. Instant yeast uses an extremely active strain of yeast and, unlike active fresh and active dry, requires only a single dough rise prior to baking. The trade-off for instant yeast's fast action is less flavor. Many bakers actually prefer a slower rise to produce more complex textures in the finished baked goods.
Benefits
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All three types of baker's yeast are high in protein and B vitamins such as riboflavin, niacin, folic acid, and biotin. Nutritional values and potency of all three types degrade as they approach the end of their shelf lives.
Warning
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Never consume yeast in its raw active form because it will continue to grow in your digestive tract and actually strip nutrients from your body. "Nutritional yeast" is a safe, commercially-available dietary supplement that has been processed to render it inactive.
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References
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