Yeast started, couldn't brew. Advice?

I built up my 2.3 or so Liter starter of WLP830 Lager yeast.
I put it in the fridge after it fully attenuated (night before planned brewing).
Then I couldn't brew yesterday.

Can I leave it in the fridge until Friday, decant the beer on top, let it warm to room temperature over a few hours (while I brew) and then pitch into my Munich Helles?

I'm going to try and swing a double batch day on my own on Friday. :rockin:



In case anyone is curious, I couldn't brew because I ran into a log jam with containers and working freezers. One freezer is on the fritz, and the delivery of my new lagering freezer got delayed until Sunday, so I didn't have space to handle my Kolsch, and things were too crowded to fit in the Helles. I'll have a keg space empty in the kegorator by Friday, though, so I can do the long storage of the Kolsch in there, and then I'll have space for my Helles. I'm still stuck doing Ales in the guest bathroom until I save up to replace the busted freezer, but at least I can brew!

You'll be fine. Just take it out a couple days before you brew so it gets to room temp and the yeasties wake up....

Don't panic if you have a bit of a lag time though anyway.

If you were really motivated, you could decant and feed it some more wort a couple days ahead, in essence making a starter for your starter, that way you'll know for sure that everything's fine with it by Friday.

I've got a pint left of starter. Maybe I'll pull it on Thursday and let it warm up and feed it, let it run through the night. That one pint shouldn't put too much color into the Helles.

nathan said:

I've got a pint left of starter. Maybe I'll pull it on Thursday and let it warm up and feed it, let it run through the night. That one pint shouldn't put too much color into the Helles.

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Especially if it ha time to floculate, you can still decant the majority of the liquid off of it before you pitch.

What I'd do is take it out of the fridge on brewday, and while the wort chills, I'd decant and let it warm a bit. For lagers, I like to pitch a 45 degree yeast slurry into a 50 degree wort. It gets going well, and you don't have to worry about chilling it down or shocking the yeast.

That's probably the best, then I won't have to add any more dark starter to a light colored wort.

At least I feel better knowing I don't need to just toss it. :cross:

I let a 1084 starter sit in the fridge 11 days and it worked great.