yeast starter without wort?

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todd_k

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I want to make a yeast starter with White Labs Irish Ale Yeast. My first batch had a Wyeast that had the air pocket in the pouch that you broke which started the year. The White Labs yeast is just a vial. How do I make a starter with this yeast? Can I do it before I make the wort? I plan on brewing tomorrow evening.
 
take some malt and water boil it let it cool and pitch your yeast and let it ferment like a small batch of beer without any hops. give a good shake. add some hops if you want but not needed. make sure everything is sanitary of course.
 
davy said:
take some malt and water boil it let it cool.

I assume that you mean malt extract.

Also make sure that you aerate the starter well. Shaking half full growler should be sufficient.

Kai
 
yeah malt extract dry or liquid most any type of sugar that you would use to make beer will work.
 
davy said:
yeah malt extract dry or liquid most any type of sugar that you would use to make beer will work.

I asked because you can also use malt to make a starter. But in this case you would have to make a simple mash.

But you should not take any kind of sugar. If you expect the yeast to ferment maltose, the starter should be maltose based. If it is not, the yeast may get lazy and loose its ability to metabolize maltose.

Kai
 
Well there are different schools of thought on the gravity of the starter.

One says, it should be the same as your wort but not higher than 1.060. If you do this you simply aerate the starter, pitch the yeast, let it go into high kraeusen and pitch the whole thing.

The other says it should not be higher than 1.040 and you should aerate it as often as you can to keep the yeast in it's aerob cycle. This is where it grows the best and actually utilizies the maltose most efficiently. But in this case you don't want to pitch the whole thing. Settle out the yeast by fermenting it out or putting it in the fridge (the latter works best with ale yeast) and decant the liquid. Use the chilled wort to resuspend the yeast cake and pitch.

I'm doing the latter as it allows me to grow more yeast and don't have to worry about polluting my wort with a generic starter.

But If you are just starting out and want to have an advantage over simply pitching the tube/package, use the first method by making 1qt of starter with the same gravity as your wort.

As advanced reading:
http://www.maltosefalcons.com/

there are goos "starter" articles in the tech tip section.

Kai
 
Check this link from BYO

http://***********/feature/37.html

According to them you should do the following:

Mix two cups water and four tablespoons DME.

Bring to a boil, watching carefully.

Let the mixture cool thne pitch yeastand let it go.

Read the article because I only paraphrased but that is basically the jist.

What type of beer are you making?
 
I'm making an Irish Red Ale from More Beer. I wanted to have it ready for St Patricks Day but I didn't get it in time.

Thanks for the info and the link.
 
Anytime I am just glad to find another brewer so close. Do you ever go the James River Homebrew club meetings.
 
davy said:
Anytime I am just glad to find another brewer so close. Do you ever go the James River Homebrew club meetings.

Nope, never even heard of it. Where do they meet? I figured there would be more interest in homebrewing around Richmond. I guess almost everyone here is satisfied with waking up with the Bud Muds.
 
I heard Chris White (on the radio) saying you don't need to make a starter for the White Labs yeast as it is a pitchable number of cells. If you are making a starter it needs to be at least 2 liters for any cell reproduction. A smaller starter will just wake the yeasties up, not make more cells. This will cut down the lag time, but just warming the vial up should have the same effect.
 
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