Reusing Roselare Yeast Cake...

I have a Flanders Red that I am about to rack off the Roselare Yeast cake that I originally pitched back on 1/1/11. I added about a lb of Red Currants to the beer about 8 months ago, and some are still floating on top in what's left of the pellicle.

What do you think I should do?

Do you think I could rack a new wort onto the old yeast cake as is?

Should I just sterilize a strainer and try to scoop out as many of the old currants prior to racking as I can, and then rack the new beer onto the yeast cake?

Wash the yeast cake?

Or should I just start all over?

Thanks!

Usually your bugs are more aggressive and active the second go around. So I'd say they're definitely worth reusing! I would recommend that after you rack the beer off adding some sterilized water and rouse the yeast then siphon it off to leave the currants behind.

Also where did you get your currants? I have a beer on roeselare right now that I want to add some fruit to in a few months.

I just reused the Roselare cake from my oud bruin that I transferred to secondary. I racked a couple of gallons of a low ABV berliner weisse-ish beer onto the cake, and after only one month, its plenty sour and tastes great. So yeah, go for it.

I've reused the cake and it came out great.

For black currants, the only place I found was www.curantc.com. I'd get the dried ones, not the frozen. Every time I go into a whole foods / fresh market, I look for them, but they are unobtanium it seems.

I was wondering how many times someone has reused this yeast with good results? I re pitched on the cake once wondering if I could get another beer out of it? thoughts

Homebrewtastic said:

Usually your bugs are more aggressive and active the second go around. So I'd say they're definitely worth reusing! I would recommend that after you rack the beer off adding some sterilized water and rouse the yeast then siphon it off to leave the currants behind.

Also where did you get your currants? I have a beer on roeselare right now that I want to add some fruit to in a few months.

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Nice... never thought of doing that. How much sterilized water do you add before you stir it up and rack it? Do you then let it sit, and then decant the water off before adding the new wort? Or just rack the new wort on top of the water?

I got the currants fresh at a local farmers market in late summer. It's definitely not currant season now, so you will most likely have some trouble finding any fresh ones.

It took me a while to find the currants even when they were in season, so I feel your pain. I've been thinking about planting some currant bushes, but I'm not sure they would grow in the area I have to plant them.