1st Brew Tomorrow! Yikes!!!

[dmaxdmax]

Call me chicken but I'm really intimidated. I'm making a Belgian wheat extract pre-pack and the directions are a lot like the sticky so I probably won't screw up the series of steps too dramatically. I hope. I've got 3 questions:

1 the kit calls for adding the extract to the cold water while the sticky says to wait for a boil. Does it matter?

2 The kit is silent regarding aeration. It seems to me that pouring from the pot to the primary from a height of 6-12 inches must introduce a ton of oxygen - isn't it enough? What about pouring from pot to pail and back again? I am a certified klutz with a dodgy back and will not try the shake-like-a-paint-can method.

3 When it comes time to pitch the liquid yeast how should I mix it in? A few gentle stirs? More? I don't know how heavy the relative fluids are so I don't know if it will sink, float or gracefully blend. The boiling and cooling will happen outside so I'm tempted to move the primary to its "new home" and pitch once it settles down.

I'm sure I have more than 3 but that's all I can come up with at 1am.

Thanks!

 

[dmaxdmax]

Question 4: what's the point of measuring the initial gravity? I understand the idea of checking it to make sure the fermentation has stopped but I don't recall reading what I'm supposed to do with initial information.

Thanks.

 

[Stauffbier]

1) The extract will mix in easier if the water is hot.
2) Pour back and forth a couple times, but make sure you have cooled your wort to pitching temp first.
3) Just dump it in, the yeasties know how to swim on their own!
4) Always take Original Gravity and Final Gravity readings. It's the only way to know what's going on with your beer.

 

[two_one_seven]

1) I like to add extract before the boil but not too much. That way you can use the hot water to rinse the malt out of its container.

2) I place my fermenter on a blanket and sit and rap my legs around the fermenter and rock it back and forth. Works really well for me.

3) The liquid yeast will mix in. If you aerate by the above method that will mix the yeast in perfectly.

4) measuring initial gravity is used to calculate the ABV by subtracting the final gravity.

Hope that helps.

 

[skullface1818]

In my experience (not much) the yeast will mix itself. Just try to not get too much on the side of your carboy and you should be fine

youl see fermentation beginning within a matter of hours.

 

[Maxkling]

youl see fermentation beginning within a matter of hours.

Or days so don't freak out if it doesn't take off right away.

 

[RM-MN]

When you use liquid yeast there aren't enough yeast cells in the vial to properly ferment your wort. No problem, yeasts are live creatures and will propagate to make more, but....

but the yeast needs some help creating cell walls and the proper ingredients for that don't exist in your wort, but oxygen is all it needs so you need to aerate as the boiling drives out all the oxygen. The more oxygen you add, the better the yeast propagation (to a point, but that takes pure oxygen, an air stone, and time) so you want to aerate as much as you can. Just pouring the wort into the fermenter is really not sufficient so you pour it in, pour it out, and pour it back it. If you have an airstone (sanitized) and an aquarium pump you can get more oxygen in and adding pure oxygen with an airstone is probably best.

 

[dmaxdmax]

Thanks, all.

My brew has been delayed one day due to a scheduling conflict and now one more day due to weather. I noticed that the liquid yeast's best by date was Saturday. My guess is that I should get a second vial to help things along - there isn't a risk of too much yeast is there?

I'm not inclined to make a starter for my first batch - it's just one more variable and chance for contamination. I'll get fancy next time.

From what I've read it seems that dry yeast is a bit more idiot-proof. What if I used a vial of liquid plus a pack of dry?

 

[unionrdr]

You could just re-hydrate a packet of dry yeast. That'll cut lag time & get their cell walls in better shape to do the job once pitched. Re-hydrating only takes 1-1.5C of boiled & cooled water for 2-30 minutes ime.
I pour the chilled wort & top off water into my plastic FV's through a fine mesh strainer. This not only gets out the grainy bits,hops,cold break,etc,but aerates way better than pouring from a height or pouring back & forth. And less work as well. Then stir roughly for 5 minutes straight to mix well & aerate further.
When I then took my hydrometer sample from the spigot,it got 2" of foam on it! So I'd say my method works pretty well.
I let the water in my partial boil get to boiling before adding my 1.5-2lbs of plain DME for hop additions. Liquid or re-hydrated dry yeast stirred & poured in will mix all by itself. But a light stiring is ok too.
And since I don't use kits,taking an OG measurement is needed. Even though I still use extracts.