Yeast washing

I saw the thread on here about yeast washing recently. Does anyone have lots of experience doing this? What are the chances that it may become infected with wild yeast or other issues? It looks like a good way to save money, but not if it ruins a batch of beer.

If you're careful and follow the directions laid out here exactly you should have little to no chance infecting anything. Don't over think it too much. It really is quite easy to do.

I have not had a LOT of experience washing but have done it a few times and there is as much worry as with the rest of brewing.

it's pretty straight forward. Boiled water is free of bad things and then refrigerated.

I really would not worry about it more then anything else.

I was going to start a thread and a pictorial today on this because I have read a bunch of people wanting to do it. I know there is several threads on the topic, but I do it a little different than most. I don’t wash more than once. I wash as it comes out of the primary and that’s as far as I take it. There are others that wash several times to get just the pure yeast. You can do that even with this method. I wash and sanitize a boil kettle w/ oxyclean first. rinse it out VERY good and then depending on the amount of washing you’re going to do fill that many cleaned mason jars w/ water and put them in the boil kettle, with the lids. Fill boil kettle to the rim of the jars. Boil the water for 15 minutes. then take the mason jars out of the water and fill the jars w/ the boiled water they just cam out of (do not cool at this point). So you now have mason jars filled w/ boiling hot water. Put the lids on them and cap, in about 5 minutes you'll hear them POP thats the lids sucking down and sealing. I let them cool on the counter for and hour before I put them in the fridge. I will keep the sanitized water for a month or so before I toss it out and make new.

When I am ready to use it and wash the yeast in my primary. I simply pull a jar or 2 out of the fridge several hours before I need to use it to let it come up to room temp. Sanitize all your transfer tubing the tops of the mason jars. Make your transfer from primary to secondary. Then just dump in 1 or 2 of the mason jars of water and put the lids back on the jars as fast as you can. your going to need them later. and put some foil over your carboy (if you used on for primary, if using a bucket just set the lid back on it and give a GOOD shake and swirl then let it set for 5-7 minutes. then open your mason jars and pour the top yeast into the jars. now cap and refrigerate in a cardboard box in the fridge. I use the box to keep the jars in the dark and keep them at a constant temp.
I will have a pictorial up in a few days. I started my water today I am doing a diacetyl rest on my blonde right now. I will wash my yeast for storage in a few days. I will keep this yeast like this for several months before I toss it out and not risk it any further.
I hope that helps.
Cheers
JJ

Clickety Click! https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/yeast-washing-illustrated-41768/

KayaBrew said:

Clickety Click! https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f13/yeast-washing-illustrated-41768/

Click to expand...

Yep thats the ticket. That's how I do it too.
Great find!





Hmmm I think I have seen that before?

I like to do yeast starter splitting instead of washing.
Its basically the same idea as yeast washing (getting more bang for your buck out of your yeast) except without the washing part, and your yeast is healthier!

First, I prep, boil & clean 6-8 quart mason jars, making sure to keep the mason jars topped off in the pot with boiling water. Boil your lids and the tips of a pair of tongs, I can screw the tops of the mason jars on while still in the boiling water, its not very hard.
Then I shove em in the freezer and get them down to pitching temp.

While I am boiling the jars I am also am boiling a 2L flask of 1.080 starter wort from ex-light DME, this neatly comes out to 1lbs. Then I chill this guy down.

Once everything is down to temperature, I take my mason jars and get them ready for action. This involves removing the lids and pouring out 2/3rds of the water. Then I take my chilled wort, throw in my vial, mix vigorously and then start filling up the mason jars with my wort + yeast until its about 3/4 the way full.

The extra water that was still in the mason jars dilutes the stronger wort down to around 1.045, and i get about 3-4 liters worth of starter in nice clean separated containers for use later!

This method will let you propagate out as much yeast as you need, while keeping it sanitary and convenient. The yeast never has to go through fermenting an entire beer and getting worn out from the process.

Since you are always using this low stressed yeast you should be able to use each of these mason jars as the basis for another starter, which you could then split again into many more mason jar starters!

So far this method is working awesome for me.

What's the big difference between the two? All I can see is you leave 1/3 of the water in the jar??

I have washed yeast a half dozen times, each time I go for about 4-5 jars of yeast, unless its a strain I don't use much and then its just a couple jars.

I have never had a washed yeast go bad, get infected, or not respond when I made a started out of it (even after 6 months).

I am not a thrifty brewer, but it saves so much money, I would never go back to buying yeast for every batch.

I've been washing yeast for years.

Just keep everything clean and you should not have any problems.

starting washing shortly after starting brewing (after 3rd batch) last year. Have washed about 8-9 bathches and all have been 100% contaminate free. Have used many of the washed ones in starter and all have been great (no dead ones). Just follow the directions and it is very simple and has saved me a ton of money.

Grinder12000 said:

What's the big difference between the two? All I can see is you leave 1/3 of the water in the jar??

Click to expand...

Well if you split your starter before hand you don't have to cleanup the mess after. Its just like making a starter but splitting it into jars, very little extra work required.
You also get the advantage of the yeast being younger, healthier and less stressed out from not having just gone through and fermented out a potentially hoppy, highly alcoholic beer, both of which can be detrimental to the quality and lifespan of the yeast.