What to do with my tainted yeast

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JonBoy47

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So I made a starter with wlp001 and long story short I believe it got infected along the way. While I was making the starter it developed a sour smell which turned to a slightly vinegar sour smell. After chilling the starter I tasted it....and wouldnt you know it was sour! But if you took in to consideration the fact that it was an oxidized unhopped batch of beer it didnt taste bad. It had the sour character of any production sour I have tasted.

Now on to my question....what should I do with this yeast? I dont like to waste things, especially my money, so I want to make a batch of beer with it. Does anyone have a recipe suggestion for a type of beer that if it were to develope a sour character it would be ok? I just started brewing all grain so any all grain suggestions would be great.
 
I was thinking more along the lines of using it to ferment a batch of beer. That would be some expensive yeast nutrient!
 
Try a small batch of a low gravity beer. That way if it tastes like vomit, you didn't spend too much on grain/hops. Just make sure to replace any non-glass that touches those mystery soldiers!
 
Now on to my question....what should I do with this yeast? I dont like to waste things, especially my money, so I want to make a batch of beer with it. Does anyone have a recipe suggestion for a type of beer that if it were to develope a sour character it would be ok? I just started brewing all grain so any all grain suggestions would be great.

Listen to yourself....you are worried about wasting 5-10 bucks spent on a failed starter so you are going to invest another 20-30 bucks in beer ingredients (not to mention the time you'll spend making said beer), all to make good on your initial investment in your starter.

This is throwing good money after bad.

Throw the failed starter away, figure out what went wrong and what you can do the prevent this happening again, and move on.
 
i didn't realize you actually wanted to make beer with the tainted starter that's why i suggested making yeast food. make a beer and see what happens, let us know.
 
Im not so worried about wasting the money I spent on the yeast. I just put the effort in to making the starter and it will be at least good for an experiment. All grain batches are pretty inexpensive so I dont think it would be a huge waste to put another $15 into a little experiment. It could make liquid gold for all I know!!! I would really just like some recipe suggestions so that if the batch does come out on the sour side it wont take like the afore mentioned vomit.
 
Cold crash it, decant it and use the yeast. The WLP001 starters I've made on stir plates all seem to have this slight sour smell, though I've never tasted one. The first time it happened I thought it was infected and threw it out. When it happened again I used it and the beer turned out perfectly.
 
I dont like to waste things, especially my money, so I want to make a batch of beer with it.

Dump it! Don't waste any more money. Next time use US-05, same yeast strain for 1/2 the price and no starter required.





boil it and use it as yeast food in your next batch.

I didn't know you can do that. Where can I read more about it?
 
Cold crash it, decant it and use the yeast. The WLP001 starters I've made on stir plates all seem to have this slight sour smell, though I've never tasted one. The first time it happened I thought it was infected and threw it out. When it happened again I used it and the beer turned out perfectly.

I have heard this from multiple people which is one of the reasons I want to make a batch of beer and see what happens. But again, I would really like some recipe suggestions or at least style suggestions that wouldnt taste terrible if they went sour.
 
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