Storing Yeast

So I went to the local brewery yesterday and they pulled me a mason jar full of English Ale yeast for my next few homebrews. I was wondering if anyone had any storage suggestions. Right now it is just sitting in my fridge. I didn't know if anyone had any ideas how I can make it last longer.

Dave

I had the same thing happen to me, but with a wit yeast. Just sitting in the fridge right now.

bechbd said:

So I went to the local brewery yesterday and they pulled me a mason jar full of English Ale yeast for my next few homebrews. I was wondering if anyone had any storage suggestions. Right now it is just sitting in my fridge. I didn't know if anyone had any ideas how I can make it last longer.

Dave

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It will be fine in your fridge for a few months.

If you want longer term storage than just the fridge method you might consider "freezing" the yeast. Where as normally sticking your poor little bastards in the freezer would mean a soon and painful death via punctured cell wall, mixing a solution of glycerin with your yeast slurry will prevent this. I think I did somewhere around 30%, most likely a little more since I eye balled it. I'm actually very happy but still nervous, I tested my first harvested batch of white labs 380. I froze some 100ml jars of it and used one for a batch just a day a go. Head looks strong on it so I think I'm in the clear. :rockin:

I have several yeasts in the fridge and they work fine if there is enough to be pitched. Most of the time I have to make a starter because I am brewing 10 gallons minimum and sometimes more than that. I think that yeast can be saved for long periods of time as long as they are kept fairly cold. I use 2000 ML flasks to make large starters. I use a 1000 ML flask to propogate very small inoculations of yeast and then pitch that into a new wort in the 2000 ML flask to make even more volume. All you need for a cover is aluminum foil.

My HBS tried to convince me not to try and save yeast, unless I'm directly pitching onto a cake. They view it as a potential wasted batch with little action or possible risk of off flavors or contamination, I think. I did the yeast washing and bought the glycerin and test tubes and all that, and it seemed like a lot of work!!! The whole time I was trying to keep things sterile and trying to avoid contaminating stuff, I was thinking, "The liquid yeast only costs $6 a packet. Why am I doing all this work?"

Just remember...your LHBS wants to make $$$.

I haven't purchased yeast in over a year.

I wash all my yeast, yes, even the dry yeast (experiments with this have gone well).

I refill my vials and also store in baby food and mason jars. One of my jugs has over 1/2 gal of Weizen yeast in it.:rockin:

Baby food jars work well because you can share them with other brewers.

Mason jars work well because you can just shake them up and pour any amount you want into a starter.

homebrewer_99 said:

Just remember...your LHBS wants to make $$$.

I haven't purchased yeast in over a year.

I wash all my yeast, yes, even the dry yeast (experiments with this have gone well).

I refill my vials and also store in baby food and mason jars. One of my jugs has over 1/2 gal of Weizen yeast in it.:rockin:

Baby food jars work well because you can share them with other brewers.

Mason jars work well because you can just shake them up and pour any amount you want into a starter.

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Please guys, don't get me wrong here, but if it were not for the yeast labs, we wouldn't have the great choice of yeasts we have today. I'm old enough to remember when special yeast cultures were not available to a homebrewer. So, I personally will only cut a vial or pack into 6 parts, and then buy more yeast. I really appreciate the yeast labs, but i don't want to pay more than about a buck a brew for yeast........

Buck a brew sounds like a fair number .

yeah I agree that using the vial for one brew is kind of wasteful. I'm a student still so my books cost alone what a decent keggle set up would run me to make. For example my last hefeweizen cost since I'm still extract:

6lbs Wheat DME
1oz Tettnang
1oz Hallertau

I think this ended up being somewhere around $23, maybe $24. Expensive? No, but not cheap considering what an all grainer could do. Add to this $7-8 for specialty yeast. Thats a 33% increase.

When I read this post I was amazed! I never thought of asking a brewery for yeast. I emailed on of my fave local brewerys head brewer and I asked him for yeast, hopefully he will get back to me and hook me up!