Is my yeast dead?

I bottle this beer four weeks ago do the day and not even the slightest bit of carb. I brewed this batch back before thanksgiving and wanted to leg it age in the secondary for awhile because I had tons of beer already to drink. Well now my supplies are empty and this beer won't carb!!!

I'd suggest making a yeast starter with a neutral ale or lager yeast and using a dropper to add a little bit of the active yeast to the bottles.

That's what I thought about but doing it with an extra dry yeast packet I have. Can I just sprinkle a bit of dry yeast in each beer? Can I even make a starter with dry yeast? I remember reading somewhere not to do it. Not sure why though.

MSOE_HomeBrew said:

That's what I thought about but doing it with an extra dry yeast packet I have. Can I just sprinkle a bit of dry yeast in each beer? Can I even make a starter with dry yeast? I remember reading somewhere not to do it. Not sure why though.

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With dry yeast, I'd suggest rehydrating and not making a starter.

ArcaneXor said:

With dry yeast, I'd suggest rehydrating and not making a starter.

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Do you know why it's a no no to make a dry yeast starter?

Two reasons: it's rarely economical to do so (although as dry yeast is getting more expensive, that's changing), and it depletes the cell reserves that the manufacturers "built in" to the yeast. Keep in mind that you are dealing with about twice as many cells as with a vial of liquid yeast, so the size of the starter that would be required to achieve any meaningful increase in population and viability is very large.

A single packet of dry yeast is enough to do 5G of beer itself. Rehydrating and repitching is all that should be necessary to get the process going.

Ok, then why do people opt to use liquid yeast?

ok since it hasn't been mentioned ill ask.... whats the ABV on this beer?

at what temperature are you conditioning?

According to the readings it's about 7% alcohol. The bottle boxes are in my closet at about 61 degrees. I know this is low but it's the temp that we keep out house (poor college students). My last 7 beers had no problem carbing after 3 weeks.

MSOE_HomeBrew said:

Ok, then why do people opt to use liquid yeast?

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There are many more strains available in liquid than dry form, and some people just dislike dry yeast for various reasons.