I froze yeast, revived it and its fermenting ! - Page 2

brewman ! · 03-26-2007, 08:14 PM

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I have to admit I just scanned this post. Sorry, there were lots of words!

Here is the Reader's Digest version.

I sterilized everyting. I put 6ml of glycerin and 15 ml of activated yeast in containers and froze them. I revived the yeast by placing the container in hot water. I pitched the yeast. It fermented the wort. One can probably get ferment 8 batches of beer with one activator yeast package. One should be able to keep yeast frozen indefinitely using this technique.

brewman ! · 03-26-2007, 08:19 PM

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One very important thing having a frost free freezer will significantly (adversely) affect the viability of your cultures (over time) these freezer are constantly arseing about with the temp something the yeasties won't like.

You might be able to turn off the frost free functionality with a switch (or a wire cutters !) Conversely you could get the yeast frozen well and then put them in a small cooler filled with ice packs in the freezer. That way they wouldn't thaw during the defrosting cycle.

cpbergie · 03-26-2007, 08:38 PM

Ive been wondering about this too. Just curious, how did you come up with the ratio of 6ml of glycerin and 15 ml of activated yeast?

brewman ! · 03-26-2007, 08:45 PM

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Originally Posted by cpbergie

Ive been wondering about this too. Just curious, how did you come up with the ratio of 6ml of glycerin and 15 ml of activated yeast?

Someone said the final mixture needed to be 25% glycerin. The extra ml was because we measured the glycerin with 2 strokes of a 3cc syringe.

There are a couple websites that discuss freezing washed yeast. They add a 33% glycerin/water mixture to it before freezing. I didn't want to add any water. The yeast from the activator packs is already a slurry. I just wanted to freeze that, so I picked 25% and went for it.

AdIn · 03-31-2007, 02:28 AM

Here is what I used to freeze it in http://morebeer.com/product.html?product_id=19905

Will give it a try in a few month.

brewman ! · 04-01-2007, 01:12 AM

Thanks for sharing that. I think a local supplier has tubes like those. I'll check them out. I'm going to be freezing more yeast next weekend.

Fire_travels · 04-02-2007, 09:29 PM

I am going to be try to Freeze some yeast here in the next few days and I was thinkin...I hope this is not to far off topic....but what if you frozze a White labs vial in a chunk of Ice. a contaner full of water and sumerg (spelling) the vial in it!

Would this counter act the frost free frezzer?

D*Bo · 04-03-2007, 02:00 AM

I believe the glycerin helps to keep the yeast cells from rupturing.

Fire_travels · 04-03-2007, 12:33 PM

sorry I forgot to say that I will be useing glycerin aswell!

Bellybuster · 08-07-2007, 11:54 PM

just doing some reading....
I've been successfully doing this for many years and have gotten as many as 15 10 gallon batches from one yeast purchase.
I started with a kit called the yeast Bank. It is still under $10, a bargain

http://www.countrywines.com/Winestore/beeryeast.htm