What the ph**k is Phantasm?

With the release of our latest B-Side brew: Phantasmic Mr. Hops, we caught up with Head Brewer Searlzy for a bit of a deep dive into one of the more experimental ingredients he used - Phantasm. Crack a beer, and prepare for some science!

Let’s learn about Phantasm!

YH: G’day Searlzy, wtf is Phantasm and what are its roots?

Searlzy: Phantasm is a new product out of New Zealand that is basically a process aid that is designed to encourage yeast to unlock and produce thiols.

YH: What’s a thiol…

Searlzy: Thiols are a compound, and precursors of them exist naturally in both malted barley and hops. These precursors can be 'unlocked' and turned into thiols by certain types of yeast in the right conditions. The human nose is super sensitive to thiols, and can detect them in levels of parts per trillion! They are generally perceived as being super fruity. 'Thiolized' Beers are a new trend, especially in the USA, and are a testament to the nature of the brewing industry, and how it is never satisfied and always trying to further innovate new things.

To answer the initial question, Phantasm is actually made up of powdered dried grape skins of Sauvignon Blanc grapes from the Marlborough region in NZ. They are rich in thiol precursors, so when combined with the right yeast, provide a heap of thiol production potential. 

YH: How is it used in brewing and what does it offer?

Searlzy: As it's a pretty new thing, there's not a whole lot of literature on thiolized beers. So using Phantasm is not an exact science. We chose to add it into the fermenting beer when it was most active, along with a minor portion of the total dry hop. We did this to try and encourage as much interplay between the yeast, hops, Phantasm, and remaining unfermented sugar in the wort. It was kind of like throwing petrol on a fire. I've never seen a fermentation that active, it was absolutely crazy! 

YH: Sounds hectic! How did it come across your desk?

Searlzy: I've been following it for some time. Jos Ruffell (co-founder of Garage Project in NZ) was the driving force behind its creation, and has done a bunch of podcasts and articles on it. I've never met Jos in the flesh, but I hit him up online pretty early on about when it would become available in Aus.

You see, it's actually been being used in the USA for a couple of yeast now, as they have more relaxed laws around yeasts that are considered 'GMO'. Thiol production, and therefore the usefulness of Phantasm, really hinges on the yeast having a specific gene which is called the IRC7 gene. Most yeasts that are being used in conjunction with Phantasm in the States have been genetically modified to have this gene. Yeasts that are considered GMO are illegal to use in Australia as it stands, but there are some yeasts that naturally carry this gene, so yeast selection was a massive part of this beer. 

YH: Other than sensory benefits, what are some of the other benefits of Phantasm?

Searlzy: One of the main reasons that products like Phantasm are being invented is to help save on material costs. If there is an option for brewers to be able to make a beer that is super fruity and hoppy, but without using as many hops as they would traditionally, that would certainly be attractive on a financial and cost of goods level. Prices of raw materials are only going in one direction, and it's not down! So to have other solutions available to be able to maintain or even improve quality, whilst also saving money, will be a huge thing for producers. It's all about working out the best and most efficient way to use these new products to better understand them. 

YH: Are there any similar ingredients doing the rounds that you’d be keen to experiment with next?

Searlzy: We actually used another product in PMH to try and target thiols and biotransformation in FermoPlus Fruity. It's a fairly similar product, but we used it in a different part of the brewing process. With a beer like this one, you'll never really know exactly which of all these new things was responsible for what, but that was really the point. We wanted to just chuck a bunch of cool new paints at a canvas and see what we got. And what we got is bloody phantastic as phuck!

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There ya go! Hopefully your schooners of knowledge are now a little fuller. To experience Phantasm doing its thing, click here to find our new Brewers B-Side: Phantasmic Mr. Hops at a bottle shop near you or shop online.

All photos by Yeah Rad