This post mainly discusses shopping for instant yeast in 2024.

In 2000, in Beth Hensperger in her Bread Lovers’ Bread Machine Cookbook, suggested that bread machine recipes should be different if the bread machine baker used Lesaffre’s SAF Red Instant Yeast rather than other bread Machine yeast. In my 2018 post Dry Yeast, I suggested that yeasts sold as Quick Rising or Bread Machine yeasts were equivalent,and were instant yeasts with confusing names. I used SAF Red Instant Yeast but I experimented with the amount of yeast and salt. One issue was reducing salt in bread, and one was reconciling recipes to the bread machines I used.

I was able to buy SAF Red Instant in 450 g bags from King Arthur online either directly from King Arthur’s e-commerce “sales” pages or in the Amazon market twice since 2018. I stored it in a freezer – a bag lasted for a couple of years, and hundreds of medium bread machine loaves.

Red Barn stores, a local grocery chain was sold vacuum bags of instant yeast, branded as Red Barn, a few years ago. I bought and used a bag.

I was not able to purchase SAF Instant Red in July 2024. King Arthur still sells it but its web store the site refuses to process and order that is to be shipped to a buyer outside the USA. It was possible to buy active dry yeast in grocery stores in Victoria, BC, Canada but product called instant yeast had disappeared. Walmart.ca showed 3 instant yeasts in their e-commerce but not in stock in local (Victoria) stores or available online:

• SAF Instant Red,
• Bob’s Red Mill Instant Yeast (Bob’s Red Mill no longer offers that an Instant Yeast in it e-commerce pages),
• Lallemand Instaferm.

Lallemand Instaferm was available on some Canadian e-commerce sites and at Costco, but shipping charges and Costco membership fees added to the price.

Walmart, returned active dry yeasts, including Fleischmann’s, and Bob’s Red Mill Active Dry Yeast to searches for instant yeast.

There was a shortage of yeast in 2020 during the Covid-19 pandemic. Active dry yeast is now available. There is no discussion in the media of a shortage of instant yeast products. Indeed, there are instant yeasts available in the USA and Canada

Fleischmann’s markets instant yeast as “Quick-Rise” in 139 g. glass jars sold at about $5 a jar (Walmart). Fleischmann’s also sells instant yeast as Bread Machine yeast. The Real Canadian Superstore’s Wholesale Club warehouse store listed 139 g. jars of both kinds of the instant yeast online at about $6 a jar.

I found a 450 g. foil vacuum bag of Fleischmann’s IDY (instant dry yeast) in the Real Canadian Superstore’s Wholesale Club warehouse store in Esquimalt for $6. It performed as well as SAF Instant Red in my bread machine

It would appear that the yeast manufacturers have been making yeast but perhaps deceasing the total amounts sold to for retail sale, and playing with regional supply and distribution. The search engines for many retail stores are not useful at finding things,

My browsing led me to a hit about pizza dough. In 2003 Peter Reinhart had published recipes for pizza dough in his book American Pie made with instant yeast. Daniel DiMuzio had a recipe for pizza dough made with a preferment made with instant yeast in Bread Baking: An Artisans Perspective (2010). The baking yeast companies market “pizza crust” yeast, which is not sold, as far as I can see, in Canadian retail stores. Pizza crust yeast:

… is a type of instant yeast … does not require proofing … . In addition to this, pizza crust yeast are also fortified with dough relaxers to prevent snapping back of dough when rolled, and these relaxers can cause the dough to rise quickly in the oven.

… differs from instant yeast … contains L-Cysteine which is an amino acid that serves as a reducing agent for breaking down the proteins in gluten. L-Cysteine helps to soften gluten and therefore relax dough. This is what makes dough not to shrink or spring back when you roll it.

Through this conditioning, a softer, better textured and high volume end result is achieved. Also, it becomes possible to mix, roll and bake pizzas without any proofing needed.

Another difference you’ll notice when comparing the instant dry yeast with the pizza crust yeast is that doughs made with the latter will have a much lower temperature, better consistency and will be easier to handle, even though the difference is by a small degree.

Davis Brown, November 28, 2022, Is Pizza Yeast the Same as Instant Yeast, at Thewhitemeal.com.