Harvesting yeast from my home brew

maybe i'm just lazy and don't want to go through with all the steps, but can you make a starter solution and then just take the sediment from a bottle of home brew and pour it in the starter solution?? give it maybe 2 days to take off and multiply?? i really don't have all the stuff to clean the yeast and harvest that way. so i'm kinda looking for a short cut. can it be done this way?? thanks!!

I don't see why you couldn't, but you wouldn't be starting with a lot of yeast so your results may not be optimal in terms of healthy yeast cells. However, if it can be done with commercial beers, it should be even easier with your own (more yeast sediment, fresher).

BTW, what sort of special equipment are you short for cleaning yeast? All I use is a water pitcher and some small jelly jars. I find it much easier than culturing yeast from a bottle.

i figured i'd drink like 2 or 3 home brews and put them all in. i don't have any jelly jars so i can't use those! i don't have any yeast for my batch for saturday so its either use the yeast cake thats in the fermenter(dry yeast) or use the stuff in my home brew(2 types of liquid yeast)

maybe i'm just being lazy!! lol i'll give it a shot and see if it works!

Well, you don't need a jelly jar per se...just any kind of container you can sanitize and seal. A plastic coke bottle would work just as well. Just to run down my process for future reference:

After racking a beer to secondary I add some water to the trub in the primary and swish it around cleaning up the bottom of the primary. I dump that into a sanitized water pitcher which I then cover with plastic wrap while my jelly jars (or whatever) are soaking in sanitizing solution. After 30 minutes to an hour I come back to find that most of the non-yeast in the trub has settled to the bottom of the pitcher leaving a yeast-laden solution above it. I decant that yeast laden solution into my sanitized containers, label with yeast strain, date, and generation, and pop them in the fridge. After a day or so the yeast settles into a 1/4-1/2" layer on the bottom of the jar. When I need one I just dump it into a cooled starter...I'm 4 for 4 so far.

Do a search for "washing yeast".

I start with a yeast water solution that almost fills a growler. I rack to another growler, then another. each time the water amount is reduced.

When you transfer the yeast to another container just transfer less water. As it clear/cleans and you rack to another container just reduce the amount of water you transfer. Eventually you'll end up with just enough yeast/water solution that will fit into a baby food size jar.

They label easily and more importantly, they stack well in the fridge...now if you can just find someone who has started feeding a baby....

homebrewer_99 said:

Do a search for "washing yeast".

I start with a yeast water solution that almost fills a growler. I rack to another growler, then another. each time the water amount is reduced.

When you transfer the yeast to another container just transfer less water. As it clear/cleans and you rack to another container just reduce the amount of water you transfer. Eventually you'll end up with just enough yeast/water solution that will fit into a baby food size jar.

They label easily and more importantly, they stack well in the fridge...now if you can just find someone who has started feeding a baby....

Click to expand...

The baby food jar is unfortunately on it's way to becoming a thing of the past. They're moving to plastic these days.

Dang. They make for really good nut, screw, and doodad holders in the garage, too.

not to mention good jars for mixing airbrush paint!!!!

homebrewer_99 said:

Dang. They make for really good nut, screw, and doodad holders in the garage, too.

Click to expand...

Yeah, I like screwing the lids to the underside of a shelf.

well, it looks like it worked!! every home brew that i opened i took the cake at the bottom and poured it into a starter solution. it have a nice bit of foam on the top. made a second solution and poured the first into the second. poured it into my wort this moning and it looks like its starting. has a really fine foam on the top right now. we'll see how it goes!! wish me luck!!

Good luck, and don't spend that $5 you saved all in one place! Actually, I've done 5 batches now off of one Wyeast packet of 1056, so that's more like $20 That's enough for another recipe.

its going like crazy now!!! this is actually 2 types of yeast from my 3 hearted ale. i put 2 different types of yeast in it and boy did it turn out good!!!! i drank about 4 liters of it last night while brewing!!! needless to say that all i did last night!!

I checked the grocery store yesterday and found all the baby food in glass jars.

They did have some food in these plastic containers, like the jello and pudding containers from another company. This might be a test market.

Point is, there's plenty of glass jars to go around.