Mr. Malty Beginner

I am planning on a slightly higher gravity 5 Gallon brew this weekend (OG-1.086) and am going to be making my first starter. I am using Mr. Malty (as advised by many of the folks on here). I have a 2L starter flask. I have one vial of White Labs Ca. Ale. It appears that Mr. Malty is telling me I will need 2 vials of yeast along with an approx. 2L starter. So, I will need to get a second vial of yeast? Picking up a second vial is no big deal as the LHBS is minutes from my house. Should I decant the starter wort off of the top of the settled yeast? Thanks!

You can step up to a larger starter or pitch more vials. Mr. Malty has a slider that lets you choose between the two.

Anything larger than 1L in a 5 gallon batch, I would definitely cold crash and decant

I only have a 2L flask though, so I can't go any larger on the starter. I guess I will just have to get a second vial. Thanks for your help!

ewhite1217 said:

I only have a 2L flask though, so I can't go any larger on the starter. I guess I will just have to get a second vial. Thanks for your help!

Click to expand...

What he means by stepping up is that you would make a smaller starter and then pitch that into your 2L starter. The yeast will multiply at each stage, so if you make a starter that will get you to the same cell count as you would have with 2 vials, then you could just pitch that into your 2L flask and it would be the same as if you put 2 vials in. You just have to play around with it to get the cell counts right, but for your purpose you could probably just make it easy by doing say 500-750 mL of wort and 1 vial to start, letting that develop a nice cake, chilling it, decanting the spent starter from off the top of the cake, and then pitching in the 2L starter on top of the existing yeast cake, giving it a nice swirl to get it all in suspension.

I have a 2L flask and regularly make starters with just one vial. Here's how;

1. Mix 4 cups water with 1 cup Light DME, boil, cool, pour into sanitized flask.

2. Place on stir plate covered with sanitized aluminum foil (or shake every time you walk by, Mr Malty has an option for that as well)

3. Once the fermentation has completed (no more bubbling) put in the fridge 24-48 hours until the yeast setles to the bottom of the flask. Pour off the "beer" on the top.

Repeat step 1 and 2

Pitch on brew day once the wort has cooled to pitching temperature.

Ahhhh, I get it. Thanks guys!

Innoculation rate matters more than starter size:

1 vial in 1L (100 Billion criiters/ml) will yield 152 Billion critters (0.5 doubling factor)
1 vial in 2L (50 Billion critters/ml) will yield 205 Billion critters (1.1 doubling factor)

The more concentrated the starter, the less growth yield. If you are going to use 2 vials you are better off starting them in seperate flasks to keep the concentration down, i.e.

2 vials in seperate 2L starters would yield 410 Billion cells (50B/ml) (1.1 doubling factor);
2 vials in one 2L starter would yield 220 Billion cells (200B/ml) (0.1 doubling factor)

Source: Yeast, The practical guide to Beer Fermentation