Racking onto yeast cake

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dirtymartini

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I have a Sierra Nevada clone in my primary that I will be racking into my secondary. I plan on brewing a Magic Hat #9 clone next. Can I pour the wort from the Magic Hat clone into the yeast cake left behind by the Sierra Nevada clone with out giving it any funky flavors? I ordered liquid yeast with the Magic Hat clone, but can always save that for the next brew right?

Also, what would happen if I added the liquid yeast and racked onto the yeast cake...an explosion????
 
Sure you can do this and many do. What you have is a great big starter. It is generally best to do lower gravity beers first and then the larger gravities beers 2nd. There is no need to add additional yeast but I would use a blow off tube so there are no worries.
 
Seeing as how the yeast and trub is normally mixed together I think you will have to leave it there.I might try to get out all the extra wort if possible.
 
Blender said:
Seeing as how the yeast and trub is normally mixed together I think you will have to leave it there.I might try to get out all the extra wort if possible.

I tried to screen out most of the heavy stuff when I went from the brew pot to the primary, so it doesn't look too bad. No matter what, it will still be beer right?

I would really like to try AG, but want to get few more extract brews under my belt (both literally and figuratively!)
 
Just came along this thread and want to be sure I am hearing this right. If I have beer A in a fermenter which I am going to rack off and I am brewing wort for beer B I can just rack beer B onto the yeast cake left over from beer A and I don't have to pitch any more yeasts (read buy anymore yeast).

If this is true this hobby just got a bit more fun. Buying yeast doesn't bother me and yes I realize you want to use the right yeast but if you can save here or there it makes it a lot more interesting.

Hope to have this confirmed by someone.
 
You can indeed rack off beer A and pour new wort right on top of beer A's yeast cake, trub and all.
The second beer should be bigger in all ways so that the flavors from beer A do not overwhelm beer B.
There are a few people around that are vehemently opposed to this practice since it is overpitching considerably for most beer. I racked a 2.5 gallon of BW on the cake of a 5 gallon pale ale. I seemed to work very well.
In addition, if your sanitation practices are not strong, you could be introuble doing this...
I would say do it once and then read this: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/yeast-washing-illustrated-41768/
 
Just came along this thread and want to be sure I am hearing this right. If I have beer A in a fermenter which I am going to rack off and I am brewing wort for beer B I can just rack beer B onto the yeast cake left over from beer A and I don't have to pitch any more yeasts (read buy anymore yeast).

If this is true this hobby just got a bit more fun. Buying yeast doesn't bother me and yes I realize you want to use the right yeast but if you can save here or there it makes it a lot more interesting.

Hope to have this confirmed by someone.

Yep. I have a barleywine that was fermented on a centenniel blond yeast cake... gonna repeat the process ( different first beer but even lighter) this week sometime......HOWEVER if you are really into saving some money ( not a huge amount, it is just cool to me to do this) look into YEAST WASHING. I have done it twice now and it works like a charm.
Never mind.. I lloked at Northernlads link AFTER I posted.. there ya go!
 
So, I bottled a low abv beer on Saturday and was planning on brewing a higher alcohol beer the next day, Sun evening. After racking to my bottling bucket I re-sanitized my airlock & stopper and put the carboy with the yeast/trub back into my fermentation fridge.

Life got in the way, so I didn't brew on Sunday. Now it's Tuesday, and I probably won't be able to brew until Thur or Fri. Is that too long to leave the yeast sitting there? Was the next day too long, and should I have planned to brew right away the same day? If not, how long do you guess would be too long to leave it there? Fridge is temp controlled to about 70-72 degrees.
 
I am also planning to pitch a tripel into a cake of a dubbel that is fermenting right now. How long can the yeast cake hang out before problems arise.

Thanks,

Sheldon
 
So, I bottled a low abv beer on Saturday and was planning on brewing a higher alcohol beer the next day, Sun evening. After racking to my bottling bucket I re-sanitized my airlock & stopper and put the carboy with the yeast/trub back into my fermentation fridge.

Life got in the way, so I didn't brew on Sunday. Now it's Tuesday, and I probably won't be able to brew until Thur or Fri. Is that too long to leave the yeast sitting there? Was the next day too long, and should I have planned to brew right away the same day? If not, how long do you guess would be too long to leave it there? Fridge is temp controlled to about 70-72 degrees.
Was the yeast cake disturbed? How much, if any, beer was left on top of the yeast? If the yeast was completely covered and left undisturbed, I imagine you're good to go. My rationale is that the yeast really don't know the difference between what you did and having the full amount of beer sitting on it for another week.

I left a yeast cake sit with an inch of beer on top for a week before I finally got around to washing it, but haven't had a chance to use any of it yet. I'll be making a starter to make sure it is viable but I'm fairly confident it will be usable.

While not of any use to you in your situation, I'll try to remember to report back my results. If you do end up re-using the cake, please let us know how it goes.
 
Maybe you didn't notice, but this thread is over 4 years old. I probably would have just started a new one if I were you...

But I would say if you were clean when you racked out, sealed it up right away, and left a layer of beer on top of it then you'll probably be ok to use it.

I'm not a fan of racking onto yeast cakes though. It's usually going to be an over pitch which is not great for the beer. I would use a pitching calculator and figure out how much slurry to harvest, then pitch that.
 
Maybe you didn't notice, but this thread is over 4 years old. I probably would have just started a new one if I were you...

But I would say if you were clean when you racked out, sealed it up right away, and left a layer of beer on top of it then you'll probably be ok to use it.

I'm not a fan of racking onto yeast cakes though. It's usually going to be an over pitch which is not great for the beer. I would use a pitching calculator and figure out how much slurry to harvest, then pitch that.

I did notice the age of this thread, and thought of starting a new one. But since there is some good info in here already, I thought this might add some more for future searchers. :)

I feel it was a fairly clean transfer (how can you ever be truly sure?), and I sealed it up immediately. There is not much beer on top however, and I am a little concerned about over-pitching. Maybe I'll just wash it instead...
 
So if I racked a 5 gal batch onto a cake from a half batch, would that still be over pitching?
Rack gently? Or let it splash and aerate?


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew
 
So if I racked a 5 gal batch onto a cake from a half batch, would that still be over pitching?
Rack gently? Or let it splash and aerate?


Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

If your 5 gallon batch is very high gravity then it would still be an overpitch, but not a huge one. I'm talking about 1.100 OG and above. You can just think of the first batch like you're making a 2.5 gallon starter, which is going to be excessive for most beers. I would just harvest the correct amount of slurry from the first beer and pitch that. http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

And yes, you should always aerate the wort.
 
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