Yeast - How many times can it be reused

Greetings All,

I'm new to brewing and like the idea of reusing/storing the yeast cakes from my primary. My question is: How many times can it be reused. The reason I ask is because I saw a show on the History? channel about brewing and the large commercial brewery they were documenting (Miller I think) said they reuse their yeast batches 3 times and then dump them out and start again. The reasoning was because after 3 uses the yeast would start to change its overall flavor profile. Any thoughts?

Most home brewers use the yeast up to six times....more if no off flavors result from the resuse and your sanitation practices are impeccable.

I use the smallest baby food jars they make to store my yeast and split my harvests into 4-8 jars per generation (do the math) and have had very good results. Using this method, you need to buy yeast only now and again.


Good Luck!!!

I have heard that the conventional wisdom is five generations is about the max. After that and the flavor profile of the yeast will change from all the mutations. However, I don't know this from experience. I have gone to the third generation, but no further.

John

If I get three uses I'm happy. That is what I shoot for.

I use 3, but I have gone to 5 without any problems.

I store my harvested yeast in baby food jars also. They stack well in the fridge. I also label them with the manufacturers number (WLP#XXX), name/style, and batch numbers I 've used them in and the batch number it came from.

homebrewer_99 said:

I use 3, but I have gone to 5 without any problems.

I store my harvested yeast in baby food jars also. They stack well in the fridge. I also label them with the manufacturers number (WLP#XXX), name/style, and batch numbers I 've used thenm in and the batch number it came from.

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Wow, you are one organized person! Just looking at your siggie, you seem to have your brews & recipes numbered, and your yeasts too... wow... I guess I need to start moving that direction if I ramp up my brewing this next year...

omniscientomar said:

Wow, you are one organized person! Just looking at your siggie, you seem to have your brews & recipes numbered, and your yeasts too... wow... I guess I need to start moving that direction if I ramp up my brewing this next year...

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I hear that a lot, but the truth is I am not that organized...just ask my wife...

The recipes are typed up on the computer, saved on CD, printed, placed in a document protector and posted in a binder. I also update my recipe with notes when I drink a few. It let's me know if anything has gone bad or gotten better over time. Each entry is dated. I do this until the last beer is drunk. I guess you can call that organized, but it's totally by mistake.

homebrewer_99 said:

I hear that a lot, but the truth is I am not that organized...just ask my wife...

The recipes are typed up on the computer, saved on CD, printed, placed in a document protector and posted in a binder. I also update my recipe with notes when I drink a few. It let's me know if anything has gone bad or gotten better over time. Each entry is dated. I do this until the last beer is drunk. I guess you can call that organized, but it's totally by mistake.

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Wow, I'm glad my wife doesn't read these posts... she might get ideas!

I've heard 10, but I guess it's all just a number. You're basically hoping against a mutation and I suspect some strains are more prone to mutate than others.

I've read anecdotal evidence of homebrewers using the same yeast ad infinitum with nary a problem.

What is the process to saving the yeast. Do you just put the yeast cake in the jars with a little of the beer? I have heard many time of reusing the yeast however, I have never tried.

Here's what I do, I buy one tube of liquid yeast say for example White's WLP001. I take and visually divide it into 5 or 6 parts. Each time I make a starter I pour one of the parts into my sanitized 1000ml flask and make a starter from that out of each starter I get 6, 5 gallon batches of beer. So out of 1 tube of liquid yeast I can get approximately 36 batches of beer. If you want to get anal you could probably go on for a long, long time never buy yeast. In my brew club we share yeast all the time. If you wanted to clean the profile you could even culture useing auger plates and seperating each colony of yeast cells and then culturing these into starters. This is to much work for me!!!!!

homebrewer_99 said:

I store my harvested yeast in baby food jars also. They stack well in the fridge. I also label them with the manufacturers number (WLP#XXX), name/style, and batch numbers I 've used them in and the batch number it came from.

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Yep. Fine tip Sharpie with yeast name, manufacturer's number, and date stored.


How else are we to keep track of ALL of those little bottles?

WOW! Thanks for all the replies and info everyone. I thought my question my generate a little interest but never knew I'd get so many good suggestions and ideas. Keep Brewing!

Search around here for Yeast Wash as well. There's some good commentary on how to do that and it's not that difficult. I'm of the opinion that you can save more yeast than you can use and it's more about shelf life than anything. The local brewpub I frequent reuses their yeast for years but they're brewing 8bbl every other week...