best way to make a starter

Plan on trying a starter for the 1st time this weeked.

I have read boil 1/2 cup of DME with 1-2 cups of water, cool and pitch yeast. Do you just leave it set in a jar for a day??? Or what......

What are some options (and instructions) to make a starter. I did a search and Yooper's thread was about the best I found. Just looking for some advice and pointers.

Thanks

There's a pretty good article on the wiki.

1 cup of DME to 800 ml of water should put right around 1.040


let it cool, pitch and just leave covered loosely with aluminum foil. after 2-3 days put in the fridge. yeast will fall to the bottom and you can decant the beer off the top and just pitch the yeast.

Is this 1 cup of DME per 800ml hold true for both 5 and 10 gallon batches? I was just wondering if the size of your starter needed to be adjusted for the size of your brew.
I have a 1000 ml flask and it sounds as if this would fill it up pretty quick.

use 1/2 cup and boil in two cups of water, then cool and add to flask. add water + your yeast to make a total of 800mL

for instance, i usually bring my water level to 750mL, then add the 125mL WYeast starter.

Any reason not to put the entire starter in the fermenter?

paranode said:

Any reason not to put the entire starter in the fermenter?

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you can....

but its going to introduce any off flavors that are already in the starter. sometimes you may notice it, sometimes you wont.

for a 1 liter starter, i wouldn't worry about it. for a 2 liter, it will probably affect the taste a bit. i screwed up and pitched the whole 2 liter last time and it dropped my gravity by .01, too, which kinda screwed up my clone but should still be really good beer.

if you're worried about it, leave your starter for 2 days, then stick in the fridge overnight, pour of the beer on top the next day and just pitch the yeast.

DeathBrewer said:

i screwed up and pitched the whole 2 liter last time and it dropped my gravity by .01, too, which kinda screwed up my clone but should still be really good beer.

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It did decrease your gravity, in terms of dissolved sugars, but at least you didn't really lose any ABV, since that drop in gravity was most likely a result of starch conversion to alcohol in the starter

http://www.mrmalty.com/pitching.php gives a lot of good information about yeast pitching rates and making starters.
In particular, he recommends 3 oz DME to 1 qt water for making the starter. This translates to slightly over 1/2 cup of DME to a qt or about 1/2 to 1/4 the strength recommended elsewhere in this thread.
I've been using this pitching rate for some while now with excellent results, but until today, I'd never checked the gravity of the starter.
Today, I sacrificed a heaping half cup of DME and a qt of water, and the gravity came out at 1.040 with the hydrometer, and 10 degrees plato with the refractometer; both essentially the same reading with two different instruments.
Using this ratio, oxygenating the starter before pitching the yeast, and keeping the starter on a stir plate for 18 hours with new yeast, or up to 48 hours with yeast several months old usually starts within 4 - 6 hours. Last Sunday, it started within 2 hours with a vial of WLP002 dated October '06

-a.

how long do you boil the DME and water?

10 - 12 minutes

-a.

GoBrewers said:

It did decrease your gravity, in terms of dissolved sugars, but at least you didn't really lose any ABV, since that drop in gravity was most likely a result of starch conversion to alcohol in the starter

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true, but it messed up my measurements, which always irks me off

I did the 2 cups water with 1/2 cup DME starter over the weekend and pitched last night around 11 pm. When I got up at 3 this morning to let the dog out, I noticed that the airlock was chugging away and the krausen was almost 2 inches tall.

I will always be doing starters after my last 2 brews, both have started in a matter of hours instead of taking a day or 2 as they used to.

So if I'm making a 1L starter, does it matter what kind of DME I use if I plan to pitch the entire starter? IE, for a Dunkel, should I use Dark DME as opposed to Light DME? And for a hefe, or light ale, should I use Light instead of Dark DME?

Jester4176 said:

So if I'm making a 1L starter, does it matter what kind of DME I use if I plan to pitch the entire starter? IE, for a Dunkel, should I use Dark DME as opposed to Light DME? And for a hefe, or light ale, should I use Light instead of Dark DME?

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Very good question. I was wondering the same thing myself.

I have a feeling that just using a Briess Brewers' Gold will be sufficient in any batch.

Correct me if I am wrong.

Nice thread by the way!

-- Trev

Use light or extra light DME, if you have it. If you happen to have dark laying around and you're making a dark beer, you could use it of course. I only have one 3 pound bag of DME, so I have the extra light. Works for all the beer styles, so it's less to keep on hand. I usually have enough time to decant my starters, so the color really doesn't matter.

We just talked about this the other day, here: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/showthread.php?t=27946&highlight=starter+light+dark

I suggest you make a 2L starter as it will give you about a very large cell count... here is the link to my site with directions on how to make it

Yeast Starter

Cheers

If you can get to the beer nut before you do it, they have some 1 liter pyrex flasks. You can put the flask with the water and DME in it right on the stove. The boiling sterelizes everything. Then when it cools of to pitching temp, just pitch and put the stopper w/ airlock in the top.