How to make a yeast starter - Pictorial

Mister beer keg might be a little big for a starter...you could step it up into one, I suppose, starting with a small bottle, jar or flask. You wouldn't need to step it up that big unless you're making a big beer or a lager.

And yes, I usually use light, pilsner or wheat extract, depending on what type of beer I'm making.

I like using 1/2 gallon growlers for my starters

How do you sanitize a growler.....with sanitizer or by boiling it?

Naked_Eskimo said:

How do you sanitize a growler.....with sanitizer or by boiling it?

Click to expand...

I generally just rinse once or twice - fill with hot water/cleaner - rinse twice - rinse-less sanitize and GO! If there's any build up from past starters they get hit with the bottle brush.

I am about to make my first starter and have a total noob question. With a smack pack, do you need to go through the 'samcking' and waiting for the swell before you pitch it in the starter?

Smack it like it owes you money.

how long to wait after you make your starter yeast till it is ready for the wort?
if i make the starter on a thursday nite will it be ready for a saturday brew day?
i am using a pitchable liquid yeast.

Generally, it will ferment out in about 1 day. 2 days is fine. You can pitch early, when it's actively fermenting, or wait until it's finished. Either way, your yeast are happier with the starter.

aquajon1 said:

how long to wait after you make your starter yeast till it is ready for the wort?
if i make the starter on a thursday nite will it be ready for a saturday brew day?
i am using a pitchable liquid yeast.

Click to expand...

depends how big of a starter you want. If its just a 1L starter that should be fine... if you want a bigger one, you may want to step it up, that will take a little longer.

There is a lot of talk about when to pitch the starter and how, but Ill let more experienced folk tell you about that.. since Im also new at this


you may also just want to spend some time searching around here.. lots of good info already out there.

DeathBrewer said:

Generally, it will ferment out in about 1 day. 2 days is fine. You can pitch early, when it's actively fermenting, or wait until it's finished. Either way, your yeast are happier with the starter.

Click to expand...

there you go... more experienced folk.

once i am ready to brew and my starter is done do i just pour the whole bottle of starter in the wort? swirl it up first or just the clear liquid on top?
working on my first starter here, so thanks for the help.

so i'm going to be making a starter with white labs yeast, for an IPA with an OG of around 1.072.

do i really need 3.6 liters for something like this (per the mr. malty site)?

how much malt do i use for this?

(i'm probably way over-complicating this, but...) should i be subtracting the malt i add to the starter from the malt i get in the kit? so in this kit, i get 9.3 lbs gold malt extract for the wort. let's say i use 1/2 cup DME in the starter. when brewing the wort, should i add 9.3 lbs minus 1/2 cup?

johnnyt471 said:

do i really need 3.6 liters for something like this (per the mr. malty site)?

Click to expand...

Not a fan of the mrmalty site - I'm sure I'll be drawn & quartered, but 3.6L is like a GALLON - I'm not adding a gallon of yeast to 5 gallons of wort.

I have a 2L flask. I boil 3/4 cup of extra light DME in about one liter of water, cool it, put it in the flask, triple check temps (75F), add yeast, cover with sanitized foil, shake, and set on stir plate. 2 days later, I'm pouring that into my 1.075 Double IPA...

it takes off in 4 hours at 64F - so, not bad, I'm thinking - and yes, I could let it settle and clear, and separate it out, but I'm lazy - I dump it all in (sometimes with the stir bar )

what is a stir plate?

johnnyt471 said:

what is a stir plate?

Click to expand...

This should help.

http://tinyurl.com/34vv8vd

ok so i'm going to use an old plastic milk gallon with 2L water and 6 oz. DME, and some aluminum foil over the top. would that work?

It could work, but I would wash the hell out of it and I would get something glass in the future.

I know I'm kicking up a dead thread here, but I am curious about stepping up a starter. DB mentioned waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay earlier that he went from a 1L to a 5 gal starter. What are the "rules" governing stepping up starters? What is the process? Thanks.

a 5 gallon starter????? isn't that called a batch of beer??
Holy crap...are you planning on brewing 80 gallons of beer?

A 700ml starter will work beautifully for a 5 gallon batch of beer. I'm sure others will say that it it may be sub-optimal, but with a 700ml starter you should have a lag time of about 3 - 8 hours.

Ha- nope, not trying to make a 5 gal starter. I was just curious about the process of going from a liter to 5 gal.

May be a dumb question, but when making a yeast starter is it necessary to use a stainless steel pot, or can one use an anodized aluminum pot which is more common in cooking?

It doesn't really matter what you use; you're just boiling a little water and DME for a short period. I personally never really like using aluminum, but that's just because I'm paranoid about the whole connection between aluminum and alzheimer's. But use whatever you want as long as it's clean.

tedclev said:

I know I'm kicking up a dead thread here, but I am curious about stepping up a starter. DB mentioned waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay earlier that he went from a 1L to a 5 gal starter. What are the "rules" governing stepping up starters? What is the process? Thanks.

Click to expand...

Missed this somehow. There really are no rules. You're basically making a batch of beer and reusing the yeast. Generally, we will make a 2L starter and then pitch that in the 5 gallons and then pitch that in a much larger batch. We have simply used the yeast from a 5 gallon batch, as well.

And hey! This thread isn't dead!

Gropo said:

a 5 gallon starter????? isn't that called a batch of beer??
Holy crap...are you planning on brewing 80 gallons of beer?

Click to expand...

Well, last time it was 70 gallons

Gropo said:

A 700ml starter will work beautifully for a 5 gallon batch of beer. I'm sure others will say that it it may be sub-optimal, but with a 700ml starter you should have a lag time of about 3 - 8 hours.

Click to expand...

This is true for 90% of beers, but I would recommend a bigger starter for very large beers, such as imperial stouts or belgian strong ales. Also, if you are using a yeast that falls out easily, such as some of the english strains, it is good to have a healthy pitch so it doesn't fall out TOO early.

No matter what, more yeast will generally be a good thing, ensuring that there is no stress during fermentation and resulting in a cleaner, tastier product. Overpitching is a rather difficult thing to do.

I have a question about DMS with starters. Can I boil and cool with the lid on? Or do I need to worry about DMS, and boil and let it cool without a lid? My thought process is that DME may already have DMS driven off and even if there were some in there, it might not be enough to make a difference in the final beer.

Thanks

Well I decided to just assume I did have to worry about DMS. Didn't cover the boil, until towards the end, when I half covered it to sanitize the lid, which I used half covering the pot while it cooled old school style in the sink. All in all an hour for two quarts of starter, one for each beer to be brewed Monday.

I read somewhere that if your starter is stored in the fridge, the morning of the brew you can decant it, add a bit more fresh wort and let it sit for the day, just to get the yeast going before you pitch. Any thoughts on this? How much new wort would you use (if you had a 2L batch of starter, say).

I'm still a rookie, but I made a 3L starter for a Tripel, let it ferment for a couple days, stuck it in the fridge for a week. Then on brew day, poured off almost all the beer (the yeast was all settled out), let it come to room temp, shook it up and pitched it.
I saw activity 4 hrs later!

labelgique said:

I read somewhere that if your starter is stored in the fridge, the morning of the brew you can decant it, add a bit more fresh wort and let it sit for the day, just to get the yeast going before you pitch. Any thoughts on this? How much new wort would you use (if you had a 2L batch of starter, say).

Click to expand...

You could do this. A lot of people just decant and leave a little liquid behind to mix up the yeast and don't bother with extra wort.

If you are adding extra wort, I would add a small amount (say 100 mL) of wort at around 1.050 specific gravity.

So, I read all 11 pages, and am thoroughly confused. Really, up to 3 liters of yeast starter in a 5 gal batch? This is where I start to get confused. We have dry yeast and smackpacks/whitelabs, all rated to go into a 5 gallon batch up to what... 1.055? So, if this little amount of yeast can do the job... why are we using so much more?

Second--- Have started doing yeast starters. Added 1/2 cup DME to 750ml water, boil, cool, pitch yeast into 1000ml flask. So, I want to grow more yeast and increase the size. I simply "build" another dme/water/boil/add to flask after decanting?

Any help here would be appreciated. Also, how much yeast would you pitch at a 1.092 OG delirium.

Thanks!

I was just wondering about this topic. So I'm going to go a head and TAG it now so I can read it later. :rockin:

This is where I start to get confused. We have dry yeast and smackpacks/whitelabs, all rated to go into a 5 gallon batch up to what... 1.055? So, if this little amount of yeast can do the job... why are we using so much more?

Click to expand...

I think you'll probably find several opinions on whether or not a starter is neccessary. I personally have never made a starter, nor have I made any "big beers". From my understanding yeast starters are generally only made when using liquid yeasts and are used to make sure the yeast is still viable and active/ready to eat some sugar. If you do a search for pitch rate calculator I'm sure theres a link to one floating around somewhere that can tell you the pitch rate for the 1.092 beer. I think the majority of the time you're probably okay just tossing the yeast in, but starters offer a way to make sure the yeast is viable or to increase the cell count to handle a higher OG beer.

tevbax82 said:

So, I read all 11 pages, and am thoroughly confused. Really, up to 3 liters of yeast starter in a 5 gal batch? This is where I start to get confused. We have dry yeast and smackpacks/whitelabs, all rated to go into a 5 gallon batch up to what... 1.055? So, if this little amount of yeast can do the job... why are we using so much more?

Second--- Have started doing yeast starters. Added 1/2 cup DME to 750ml water, boil, cool, pitch yeast into 1000ml flask. So, I want to grow more yeast and increase the size. I simply "build" another dme/water/boil/add to flask after decanting?

Any help here would be appreciated. Also, how much yeast would you pitch at a 1.092 OG delirium.

Thanks!

Click to expand...

Underpitching is dangerous in that it stresses the yeast and you risk it pooping out too early, leaving you with an underattenuated and sweet beer. Yes, a vial or smackpack should do the job for beers 55 and down; making a starter is an option for checking the viability of the yeast and helping your ferment get off to a good start.

Overpitching is risky in that it can lead to higher ferment temps and a lot of extra ester production in your beer. The good news is that you are really going to have to work super hard to overpitch, so don't worry about it because you'll probably never do it by accident. Generally, if I brew a beer up around the 90s, I make a starter, give it a day, then repeat the process from the OP (boil DME, cool it, then mix with yeast). I might decant some of the liquid off first before I add the fresh DME. That is one "step up." It is a good idea to do another step up for such a big beer just to be safe (and don't worry, you aren't overpitching). It's safe to say that you would be overpitching if you pitched your beer onto a yeast cake and then added a starter that has been stepped up twice.

Another option you have in brewing big beers to make sure that your yeast can handle the fermentation is to feed your sugars (if you have any). So if your recipe calls for a pound+ of, say, candi sugar, then don't add the sugar to your boil. Let your fermentation go for four or five days and then boil your sugar with just enough water to make a syrup and then cool and add that to your fermenter. At this point, your yeast will be plentiful and acclimated to the alcoholic environment. Some people also worry about adding too many simple sugars initially because the idea is that the yeast consume those first and then more or less putter out, again leaving you with really sweet underattenuated beer. Hope this helps.

And don't sweat it. Starters are easy, and it's better to spend a week stepping up a starter for a healthy pitch rate that may seem to "be a little high" than it is to have fermentation crap out on you because you were afraid to pitch too much. Again- you won't overpitch without trying really really hard to do so. Happy brewing!

tevbax82, another benefit of a starter (if not already mentioned) kicking a fermentation off faster makes it less likely to get contaminated.

Does it matter how much yeast I put into my starter? I've got a 125mls (4.25fl. oz.) smack pack, it's okay to dump that all into my 2 cups of water and .5 cup DME mixture or would I need to use more dme/water?

I'm using wyeast smack pack 1187. It says on the package contains 100 billion yest cells designed to directly inoculate 5 gallons of wort, but all I've read says a starter is still a good idea to keep everything clean and healthy.

Anyone???

Probably should've waited for an answer, but I'm cooling my mini-wort right now and about to pitch my yeast. Don't want to mess up my first starter!

Sounds just right....it'll be perfect.

I'm about to brew a bourbon porter at 1.06. Is the 16 oz to 1 smack pack OK for this, or do I need a bigger starter?

That should be fine, but if you have time to make a starter, it certainly won't hurt. Happy Brewing!

I am making a starter; my question was whether or not the 16 oz water - 1/2 cup DME was sufficient for a 1.06 brew. I've seen some say it's good for up to 1.06, but other say it's only good up to 1.055. The starter is already made at this point, though, so I'm going to give it a go and see what happens.

Another starter question: Let's say I wanted to do a big ol' 1-gallon starter for something like a 1.090 beer, but I didn't have a big enough vessel to do the starter. Then let's say I let a 1/2-gallon starter run it's course, decanted the spent wort and added a 1/2-gallon of fresh wort to the container. Would stepping up like that give me the same amount of growth as a 1-gallon starter?