Overpitched Danstar British Ale Yeast - What now?

I have a Northern Brewer White House Honey Ale (1-gallon kit) in the fermenter now. I brewed it on February 2nd.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/northern-brewer-white-house-honey-ale-1-gallon-kit-help-386328/

Long story short - due to the small batch size and my misreading the directions I basically nuked my wort from orbit by pitching the entire provided 11-g package of Danstar British Ale Yeast. I even made a little warm starter for it.

Needless to say the fermentation was vigorous. It was mostly done after 24 hours, krausen had fallen. I put the airlock on and got a few more bubbles but it has been completely inert since then.

How should I handle this beer to minimize any off flavors due to autolysis, etc.? Should I try to get it off the yeast by doing a secondary, or should I let the yeast try to mop up any mess?

You are fine. There's no such thing as over pitching, unless you do something like a 1 gallon starter for a 2 gallon batch. You don't have to worry about autolysis in primary if its less than 2 months. some people would even say up to 3 months or so. Secondary wouldn't hurt to clear it up further once it fully done.

Now what? Sit back, bottle, and enjoy! Thats what...

After I bottle this batch, can I put fresh wort on this yeast to utilize it? If it is healthy, my only concern after that is avoiding another messy blowout.

Yes, you can reuse the yeast. You will just need to wash it first before reusing to separate the yeast from the trub left over. There are a number of threads on washing yeast. I believe there is also a sticky in at the top of "fermentation and yeast" that has step by step with pictures.

Thunder_Chicken said:

After I bottle this batch, can I put fresh wort on this yeast to utilize it? If it is healthy, my only concern after that is avoiding another messy blowout.

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Yep. You can pour a fresh batch right on top, no need to wash. The yeast will get to work very quickly and probably finish quickly. Be prepared for a very vigorous fermentation.

Hmm...ffaoe says OK to reuse yeast with washing, Colohox says OK to reuse just as is. So what's the right answer?

I assume that there is still a major surplus of yeast cells in the fermenter trub. Should I wash it and divide it into smaller batches so I am pitching at a more appropriate rate?

Thunder_Chicken said:

I assume that there is still a major surplus of yeast cells in the fermenter trub. Should I wash it and divide it into smaller batches so I am pitching at a more appropriate rate?

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That's my reasoning behind my suggestion.
Colohox isn't wrong. You can pitch right onto the yeast cake, it will just build up even more trub and yeast at the bottom of the second batch.

There is no right answer. Washing is best when you are going to save the yeast for a length of time. If you are making a similar batch of what was previously in the fermenter, you can just throw the new wort in. Mixing styles will blend some of the flavors (which can be fine). For example, you probably don't want to put a blonde ale on the cake from a stout or an ipa.

So I *could* just put fresh wort in the fermenter, but I risk another Beer-cano? The evil stare I am getting from SWMBO suggests that washing and dividing might be a cleaner and therefore better option.

I'm sticking with pretty basic ales for the time being, so reusing the yeast won't matter.

Thanks all!

Also, the effect of autolysis on the homebrewing scale is debated. For the volumes we make, it is very difficult to actually overpitch and have that be the cause of off flavors. You likely added a great amount of yeast that you could reuse a few times.

Thunder_Chicken said:

So I *could* just put fresh wort in the fermenter, but I risk another Beer-cano? The evil stare I am getting from SWMBO suggests that washing and dividing might be a cleaner and therefore better option.

I'm sticking with pretty basic ales for the time being, so reusing the yeast won't matter.

Thanks all!

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You can have a beer-cano just by pitching a single tube of yeast. I pitched a single tube of california ale into an average gravity rye at 65º and spent yesterday afternoon cleaning it off my ceiling. The wife was not happy about that one.

It's good to hear that it's relatively insensitive to blunders on the homebrew scale.

I've read that flavor compounds (good? bad?) are generally produced by yeast during growth, and less so when not growing. By overpitching, you are greatly reducing the amount of growth and so reducing yeast-related flavors. I guess autolysis doesn't really bite until the nutrient levels get so low that everything starts dying.

I took a video of the fermentation in the carboy - it was impressive. It might have been my imagination but the carboy actually felt warm to my hand (and I had cold-crashed the wort so it was originally just at a cool room temperature when I pitched). It was scary

Thunder_Chicken said:

I took a video of the fermentation in the carboy - it was impressive. It might have been my imagination but the carboy actually felt warm to my hand (and I had cold-crashed the wort so it was originally just at a cool room temperature when I pitched). It was scary

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Yep. Stan Hieronymous wrote in "Brew Like a Monk" that a lot of the Trappist yeasts can increase the beer in temperature by 10-15 degrees compared to the ambient temperature. Also I believe that a majority of the heat can be found in the center of your fermentation vessel which makes those stick on carboy thermometers not very good indicators of your actual temp.

I had a double packet nottingham 90 minute ipa clone ferment insanely vigorous up until this morning. the temp was 79-80 when i woke up. P.S. it is 64-65 in the house.

PhelanKA7 said:

Yep. Stan Hieronymous wrote in "Brew Like a Monk" that a lot of the Trappist yeasts can increase the beer in temperature by 10-15 degrees compared to the ambient temperature. Also I believe that a majority of the heat can be found in the center of your fermentation vessel which makes those stick on carboy thermometers not very good indicators of your actual temp.

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I have an electric thermometer probe that I sometimes have dangle directly into the center of a glass carboy. It has always read the same as the fermometer strip.

I have not done this with a plastic container though, so I cannot comment on that.

bobbrewedit said:

I have an electric thermometer probe that I sometimes have dangle directly into the center of a glass carboy. It has always read the same as the fermometer strip.

I have not done this with a plastic container though, so I cannot comment on that.

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It will depend a lot on how much air circulation you have around your carboys. If you have an insulating cover (even just a bag to stop air flow) over your carboys the internal and surface temperatures will be about the same. If you have air circulating around the carboys there will be a difference. Plastic and glass are both good insulators so I would expect material would make less of a difference.

I wouldn't worry about autolysis. I have had the problem only once and that was because I wanted to see what would happen if I pitch the slurry from a 3 month old cider. It tasted like licking a doctor's shoe. So don't do that and you should be fine.