Yeast washing Qs, making starters

I like to try my hands at yeast washing. I'll be racking a beer in about a week and I want to get setup with the proper equipment. I read the sticky that uses mason jars for the yeast washing. Are there other containers suitable for washing yeast aside from mason jars? Can plastic tupperware be used if cleaned with Starsan?

Also, when using washed yeast I know it's recommended to make a starter to proof your yeast, and ensure a healthy growth. Can the starter be made in the same jar after dumping off the liquid? Ideally I would like to pull out a jar, pour off the liquid, add cooled sterilized DME wort, and let it proof overnight before pitching. Does someone else follow this scheme?

thanks for the help!

mtbiker278 said:

Are there other containers suitable for washing yeast aside from mason jars? Can plastic tupperware be used if cleaned with Starsan?

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I wouldn't boil anything plastic. You could use other glass/pyrex/ss containers probably though.

Also, when using washed yeast I know it's recommended to make a starter to proof your yeast, and ensure a healthy growth. Can the starter be made in the same jar after dumping off the liquid? Ideally I would like to pull out a jar, pour off the liquid, add cooled sterilized DME wort, and let it proof overnight before pitching. Does someone else follow this scheme?

thanks for the help!

Click to expand...

The issue here would be the size of the jar. Those pint-sized jars you would be storing your yeast in if you follow the method described would not hold enough liquid to do a proper starter.

I use half gallon jars. They sell them at the grocery store and as a bonus come filled with sour pickles. When I am done racking by beer to a keg, I swirl whatever is left in the fermenter and pour it into one of the jars about 2/3 (of course I eat the pickles and wash the jar first). I then fill it nearly to the top with water, and place it in the fridge.

Since I brew in about 6 gallon containers, but lager in 5 gallon corny kegs I generally have about a bit over a pint of new beer and about a half gallon of yeast/cake. I let that slurry settle in the fridge and when I brew I pitch that, minus a bit of the cake that settled. It is my new starter and I have reused that same yeast for over a year (meaning more then 12 batches). When I started doing it I would dope the yeast with a new batch. Now I simply reuse the yeast.

It works especially well with my lactobacillus yeast (that is what you make sour beer from). I no longer have to get specialty yeast for my wheat, I just have a jar I use. And yes I have left that jar in the fridge for well over a month and it was still viable.