What Are the Functions of Yeast in Wine Making?

WIne would not be possible without yeast.

Yeast has been used to produce wines and other alcoholic beverages for thousands of years. Yeast is absolutely essential to the production of wine, because it is responsible for the fermentation process that produces alcohol in the finished beverage. Does this Spark an idea?

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Yeast
- Yeast are live, single-celled organisms classified as fungi. There are a wide variety of different yeast -- well over a thousand species -- some of which have been used to produce food and drink since at least the time of the ancient Egyptians. They do not require sunlight and obtain their energy by using simple sugars as a food source. Yeast occur naturally in many places, including on the skins of fruits and on some plants.
Yeast in Wine
- Wine is typically made from a liquid mixture of crushed grapes. The grapes will already contain some naturally occurring yeast on their outer skins, but other strains of artificially cultured yeast are almost always added to make the flavor and type of wine produced more predictable.
Alcohol from Yeast
- The biggest difference between wine and grape juice is the presence of alcohol in wine. Yeast is responsible for making that alcohol. In a process known as fermentation, yeast "eats" sugar either naturally present or added to the wine mixture, and excretes alcohol. As fermentation progresses, the alcohol level in the wine increases until it reaches a level that is poisonous to the yeast and they die. Most strains of yeast will die at about 15 percent alcohol, so this is the maximum alcohol level of typical wines.
Carbonation from Yeast
- Besides producing alcohol, yeast also provide the fizz in sparkling wines such as Champagne. During the fermentation process, yeast produce carbon dioxide gas as a by-product of their metabolism. Normally, this gas is allowed to escape during the fermentation process. To make sparkling wines, additional yeast and sugar are added to the wine just before bottling, so that fermentation takes place in the bottle to produce the dissolved carbon dioxide gas that results in bubbly wine.

YoBrew UK; "Alcoholic Fermentation"

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