Yeast Incident

Yesterday I decided to brew another batch of Pale Ale. I use EW's recipe with a slight variation. Anyway I decided to use some yeast I had saved from my last batch of Pale Ale. I had three twelve oz. Sam Adams bottles with harvested yeast. The plan was to pour them into the carboy before I drained the wort from my keggle. I cracked open the first one and it was a spew bomb: yeast foam everywhere. I managed to get a small amount into the funnel, maybe a few ounces. I cracked the second one and most of it went into the carboy. I was scared to open the third bottle but went ahead and decided to open it quickly over the funnel; bad idea. It spewed yeast everywhere, shot out of my hands and landed fifteen feet away in the yard. It covered me with yeast foam and spewed all over my barn carport. It was very close to exploding. I consider myself very fortunate not to have stitches or be in the hospital this morning.

From now on I've decided to re-use the yeast cake in the bottom of the carboy or just pitch a new packet of Nottingham. My new brew seemed to start slowly. Usually it starts the airlock bubbling in a couple of hours, so after three hours I pitched a small packet of Coopers yeast. This morning it's really percolating like crazy. It should be interesting.

The recipe:

8# 2-Row
2# Vienna
.5# Crystal 15L
.5# Honey Malt
.5# Victory

1oz. Cascade @60 min.
.5 oz. Cascade @ 30 min.
.5 oz. Cascade @ 15 min.

1 tsp. Irish Moss @ 15 min.

Nottingham Yeast(reused this time)
1 7-gram packet Coopers Yeast

It spewed yeast everywhere and shot out of my hands and landed fifteen feet away in the yard.

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Maybe homebrewing IS rocket science?

david_42 said:

Maybe homebrewing IS rocket science?

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LOL!!!!

Dave

You can wash yeast just fine without this happening. See the sticky thread about it.

No need to crimp the caps...sorry i guess thats obvious now. I keep slurries of yeast in zip lock bags, but if I were to bottle some yeast, perhaps aluminum foil to seal it??