When we think about the yeast of beerthe first image that might come to mind is that of small dry granules or a loaf soft and humiduseful for making dough rise. From a scientific point of view, brewer’s yeast is composed of colonies of unicellular fungi (Saccharomyces cerevisiae). But if we looked at it under a microscope, what would we see?
In this video we took a small amount of a fresh yeast cube and we have it suspended in water. We then took a drop of the suspension just formed and we observed it directly at microscope.
What can be observed are many microscopic ones little spheressimilar in size to those of blood cells redor between 5 and 10 micrometers (thousandths of a millimeter) in diameter. Each of the clear ovals that you can see in the image below, which we made under the microscope, is nothing more than one single cell Of Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Cells are also smaller or larger depending on their stage of development.
This body it is neither one plant nor a animalbut rather a fungus microscopic in size. They are essential mushrooms for bread making and the production of beer And winewhere they play a fundamental role: they feed on sugars present in the dough or must and metabolize them, transforming them into anhydride carbonic (a gas) ed ethanol (commonly known as ethyl alcohol).
These two substances are what make bread and pizza dough swell and grow. During the cooking of the dough, however, the heat it kills the yeast cells and at the same time allows carbon dioxide to expand and swell the dough. So every time we eat a sandwich or a pizza, we are also eating gods mushrooms microscopic.
