Using yeast at the bottom of the bottles.

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jonbomb

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I seen a video a while ago and even read about it in the book that came with my starter kit. The yeast at the bottom of my bottles can I somehow save that and use it?? Or even combine some bottles yeast??

Or is the yeast in the bottom dead?
 
It would be easier to harvest from your primary, unless your talking about harvesting the yest from a bottle-conditioned commercial brew.
 
Basically, you add a small amount of sterile/distilled water to the yeast cake after you've racked the beer out. Pour that into a sanitized container (I use a large mason jar), and let separate. Pour off the yeast into another sanitized container or containers, leaving the trub behind. Top off container with sterile/distilled water as needed to fill the container. Store in the fridge until needed.

That's the condensed version. Here's a pretty good guide. You can search this board or google for yeast washing.

I read that the yeast shouldn't be stored beyond 4 months or so, but I haven't put that to the test. I always seem to use it faster than that.
 
yeast harvesting looks fun! So essensially you are using other yeast to creat your own... can you maybe someone harvest two different strains together ??

You use these just as starters not your actual yeast you will pitch correct??
 
I make a 1L starter when I use my harvested yeast. I've read some folks simply decant an pitch. No reason you couldn't do that, but the starter allows you to make sure the yeast if viable and increase the cell count.
 
You certainly can combine strains, but keep a couple of things in mind:

1. Yeast doesn't reproduce sexually, so you won't get a sort of mixed breed yeast out of the deal.

2. Their flavor profiles may or may not complement each other (though experimentation is always encouraged!).

3. It's likely one will be stronger than the other. In that case, one will overtake the other in time. If you find a combination you like, it would be best to recombine them for ever batch (I would guess).
 
I have fun harvesting yeast from bottles.

One thing I have found that helps, is to use the slurry from multiple bottles of the same beer. Last summer I did a really successful Hoegaarden harvest from 12 bottles. What I would do is after pouring the beer into a glass, I would spray the lip of the bottle with starsan and then re-cap with a sanitized cap. Then store in the fridge until I had enough bottles. Then on harvest day I would spray the caps again with starsan, open them, flame the lip of the bottles, and re-spray with sanitizer, then pour the dregs into my starter.

I ended up with 2 good sized mason jars with yeast. It's made some really tasty wits since then.

This is a pretty good list of beers with harvestable yeasts, though it is waay incomplete and hasn't been updated. It's still a good source. http://www.nada.kth.se/~alun/Beer/Bottle-Yeasts//
 
Revvy said:
I have fun harvesting yeast from bottles.

One thing I have found that helps, is to use the slurry from multiple bottles of the same beer. Last summer I did a really successful Hoegaarden harvest from 12 bottles. What I would do is after pouring the beer into a glass, I would spray the lip of the bottle with starsan and then re-cap with a sanitized cap. Then store in the fridge until I had enough bottles. Then on harvest day I would spray the caps again with starsan, open them, flame the lip of the bottles, and re-spray with sanitizer, then pour the dregs into my starter.

I ended up with 2 good sized mason jars with yeast. It's made some really tasty wits since then.

This is a pretty good list of beers with harvestable yeasts, though it is waay incomplete and hasn't been updated. It's still a good source. http://www.nada.kth.se/~alun/Beer/Bottle-Yeasts//
Click to expand...

I just pour some sterile wort (about half a cup) - can be made up from DME - into the bottle in question and then swirl it every now and then. Depending on the viability of the yeast, activity will be apparent from 3-7 days. Smell the culture to see if it corresponds with the beer harvested from and then step up the starter.
 

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