I got a couple bottles of Bell's Pale Ale in the '09 Secret Santa swap, I drank one before I realized it was unfiltered but just this week tried harvesting from the other bottle. I've built it up to a 1.7L starter and plan to make a low-grav Pale Ale this weekend, then a Two-Hearted clone with the cake. It appears Bell's Brewery likes Centennial which I happen to have plenty of.
Their website says Two-Hearted Ale has an OG of 1.064 and an ABV of 7%. That's a lot of attenuation.
The stuff in the Pale Ale bottle was uber-fluffy. It would settle to be very clear but ANY agitation and that stuff would start flying around like a snow storm and took a long time to settle again.
sp1365,
FWIW here's what I did: First, the beer sat undisturbed in my fridge for a while to get everything settled. I boiled and started cooling some low-ish gravity wort (like 1.024) with Wyeast yeast nutrient before I even opened the bottle. I cooled the wort way down to like 45 degrees F. I aerated the snot out of it using a wire whisk (I cooled it so low in order to get max aeration and the yeast were already at ~40 degrees). Then after I poured the beer (leaving a good 1/2 inch), I flamed the bottle opening and poured the wort in the bottle, then covered with aluminum foil and let sit at room temp. I think it was 2 days later I noticed krausen. Then I stepped it up twice in a 2L flask on a stirplate. I didn't even decant the first starter, just poured the whole contents of the bottle into a 2L flask with cooled, aerated wort already in it. The second stirplate step was started last night and it was going strong this morning.
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Early brewers were primarily women, mostly because it was deemed a woman's job. Mesopotamian men, of some 3,800 years ago, were obviously complete assclowns and had yet to realize the pleasure of brewing beer.- Beer Advocate
Last edited by SpanishCastleAle; 02-17-2010 at 03:12 PM.
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Harvesting Bell's Yeast. Need Style
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