Leaving beer behind with your yeast?

Here's why you should primary longer than your kit's directions or the guy at the LHBS say.

This was what was left behind when I racked off my double chocolate oatmeal stout. Even with 9oz of cocoa powder, that's about a half inch at the bottom. I was able to get almost every little bit of beer off the top of it, leaving maybe 2 ounces behind.

How?
Almost a month in primary and using a flocculent yeast; in this case S-04.

Airlock stop bubbling already? Leave it alone!

Hydrometer says you're at your FG? Leave it alone!

Just leave it alone!

Not only will the yeast clean up after themselves and get rid of some of the possible off flavors, but you get a nice, compact yeast cake that you can suck the beer right off of. Don't waste a 6-pack in the primary because it's sitting with a cloud of yeast at the bottom!

This public service announcement was brought to you by a grant from The Leave It Alone Foundation and this station.

Very nice. I love a nice tight yeast cake. Thanks for posting -- I was just thinking this same thing a few days ago when I racked (after 3-4 weeks on the primary).

Hotbreak hotel...LOL...What a great name.

Yup S-04 always looks that way to me. Great yeast, won't even get disturbed much when racking. Sometimes it turns into this jelly like cake.

I just racked an Oatmeal Stout off of it's S-04 yeast cake not 10-minutes ago...mine sat for 3.5 weeks at 59 degrees......I could have taken an identical picture.

Man, S-04 makes a large cake though......even though I had close to 5.5 gallons in the fermentor, I got only 4.5 or so into the secondary......kind of bummed me out to see that, but oh well......

S-05 gave me the same thing too. Always makes me sad when I hear about people leaving a gallon or more behind.

I also still secondary, even though I'll primary for a month. That way, even if I suck up a little bit off the bottom, I'll give it a week or two in secondary for that bit to settle back out.

I had a very similar cake on my California Common (I used Saflager yeast). It was a kit with instructions to bottle it after 2 weeks I think. It had finished fermenting at day 7, but I let it sit in the primary for four weeks total before bottling it. Another 3 weeks in the bottles to carb and condition, at a minimum. At the end, it's probably going to be an 8 week old beer, minimum, before I have my first sip.

Entirely correct. Most ferments, the cake compacts to 1/3 the volume if you wait an extra two weeks. That's 4-5 pints in my book.

Great job 'cat.

That's something I tell those new brewers who complain about sediment/yest in their bottles...I get very little yeast sediment in my bottles, and they cab perfectly fine. My beer is very very clear.

I use a 10 gallon primary with just a lid, no airlock...how long is it safe to leave my beer in there for? My first couple of batches I have racked to the primary at five days or so. Also, will leaving my beer in the primary longer have any effect on my plans to re-pitch (Wyeast 1084)?

Link to recipe for the double chocolate oatmeal stout?

osagedr,

IMO you are racking too soon at five days. Depending on how tight fitting the lid is I would think you could go longer (guessing 10 - 14 days. What I have done in similiar situations is to put a plastic bag over the lid and secure it w/ a long piece of string wrapped a couple of times around the fermenter. This merely improves the seal and slows down the escape of the co2 layer.

If sanition is proper, the yeast cake will be viable for a few weeks.

RC0032 said:

Link to recipe for the double chocolate oatmeal stout?

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I based it on this recipe:
https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f68/classic-oatmeal-stout-88634/
Which I converted to a PM and added 6oz of fat-free pure baking cocoa near the end of the boil... maybe 10 minutes before flameout. My sample tasted fantastic, but I wanted something to temper the bitter just a tiny bit so I split and vanilla bean and put that in my secondary when I racked it. I'll likely bottle within a week since I just want a hint of underlying vanilla under the bitterness to boost the chocolate flavor.

Revvy: I just started drinking my brown biscuit 2.0 that I used S-04 with and left in primary 3 weeks, secondary 2 weeks. I poured one last night, watching the neck to see when the yeast started coming out to stop pouring, and it never did. I poured the whole thing in with no yeast. A peek down the bottle and I could see a thin, compact layer on the bottom. Just out of curiosity, I put an ounce or two of water in the bottle and gave it a shake and the yeast came out in the sink, but it NEVER BUDGED during the pour.

wilserbrewer said:

osagedr,

IMO you are racking too soon at five days. Depending on how tight fitting the lid is I would think you could go longer (guessing 10 - 14 days. What I have done in similiar situations is to put a plastic bag over the lid and secure it w/ a long piece of string wrapped a couple of times around the fermenter. This merely improves the seal and slows down the escape of the co2 layer.

If sanition is proper, the yeast cake will be viable for a few weeks.

Click to expand...

Thanks; I have weighed the lid down to improve the seal but will take your advice and fashion something better. I'll give it a total of 10 days or so then rack and put my next beer right in on top of the yeast cake.

I had a very similar picture when I racked a maibock (made with S-04, so not a true maibock) on Monday. It had been in primary for 16 days, and the yeast cake/trub was so thick that it looked like something out of a sci-fi flick when I tilted the fermenter to get the last bits of goodness off of the bottom. MMmmm!

I took a goodly-sized scoop of the yeast cake and put it in a sanitized mason jar in the fridge, thinking that it might make a lovely starter for a half-batch of barleywine I was planning. Is that a good idea?

My daughter and I did have to taste that chocolate yeast cake before we watched out the pail. heheheh She said "Hmmm... it tastes like... chocolate... dirt... chocolate dirt... yeah, that's it..."

khiddy said:

I had a very similar picture when I racked a maibock (made with S-04, so not a true maibock) on Monday. It had been in primary for 16 days, and the yeast cake/trub was so thick that it looked like something out of a sci-fi flick when I tilted the fermenter to get the last bits of goodness off of the bottom. MMmmm!

I took a goodly-sized scoop of the yeast cake and put it in a sanitized mason jar in the fridge, thinking that it might make a lovely starter for a half-batch of barleywine I was planning. Is that a good idea?

Click to expand...

I was just going to ask about that -- I was talking to a guy the other day who says he plans his batches ahead to brew on the same day he racks a batch so he can reuse the yeast cake -- He just racks his cooled wort right on to the yeast cake; he says those beers turn out excellent.

How realistic is it save and store a yeast cake, and how long will it stay good?

DryHopHead said:

I was just going to ask about that -- I was talking to a guy the other day who says he plans his batches ahead to brew on the same day he racks a batch so he can reuse the yeast cake -- He just racks his cooled wort right on to the yeast cake; he says those beers turn out excellent.

How realistic is it save and store a yeast cake, and how long will it stay good?

Click to expand...

If you wash it using the yeast wash sticky, and seal it in a mason jar it will stay good for several months....You can tell sometimes if it's gone bad if the band of yeast turns gray, as opposed to the creamy color it is after washing.

Do a search for "yeast washing" and you'll find lots of great tips. From simply washing and repitching immediately, to a great thread on creating a frozen yeast bank that you can use from now until the zombies take over.

Revvy said:

If you wash it using the yeast wash sticky, and seal it in a mason jar it will stay good for several months....You can tell sometimes if it's gone bad if the band of yeast turns gray, as opposed to the creamy color it is after washing.

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Forgive my ignorance, but what is "washing the yeast?" Thanks Revvy

DryHopHead said:

Forgive my ignorance, but what is "washing the yeast?" Thanks Revvy

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Just what it means, washing the yeast to remove hops and trub from it.

I take it you didn't go looking for the sticky as I suggested.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/yeast-washing-illustrated-41768/

JesseRC said:

Yup S-04 always looks that way to me. Great yeast, won't even get disturbed much when racking. Sometimes it turns into this jelly like cake.

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SO4 rocks! I actually have a hard time shifting the cake, it's so well in there.

Revvy said:

Just what it means, washing the yeast to remove hops and trub from it.

I take it you didn't go looking for the sticky as I suggested.

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/yeast-washing-illustrated-41768/

Click to expand...

Haha, I didn't b/c I thought you were referring to some kind of technique for "washing sticky" as opposed to "just read the sticky!" My bad.

Laughing_Gnome_Invisible said:

SO4 rocks! I actually have a hard time shifting the cake, it's so well in there.

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On my last wheat stout , it kinda had the texture of like skinned over pudding yogurt or something. Its supposed to be medium attenuation, but its been great on all my beers. No esters what so ever either.