1st PM/reused yeast cake - sweet...

[GoBrewers]

On Sunday afternoon, racked my Kolsch into secondary. On uwmqdman's sage advice, decided to reuse the yeast cake with an Oktoberfest-esque pseudo-lager, and picked up the Oktoberfest Marzen PM kit from Midwest supplies, sans yeast. Brewing day went great, OG = 1.052, and by bedtime there was some big time activity in the fermenter. By Monday morning it looked like someone dropped an M80 in that sucker - hooray for blow off tubes. This evening, I was freaking out a little cuz fermentation had slowed considerably, to about an airlock bubble every 5 sec, but an SG of 1.012 soothed my mind. And it tastes GOOD! Still has a way to go obviously, but I can't wait to crack that first bottle this summer. I think it's safe to say - no more extract-only brewing for this guy. And AG is on the horizon. And Go Brewers!

 

[vasie]

This last batch of mine was also the first time that I pitched on top of the previous batch's yeast cake. I saw activity within about 3 hours. I didn't wash the yeast cake or do anything. I figured I would just let the trub be trub and be.

For those of you that do this often, how many times can your reuse the yeast cake without separating the yeast from the trub?

 

[Yeast Infection]

For those of you that do this often, how many times can your reuse the yeast cake without separating the yeast from the trub?

I have dumped my wort on yeast cakes a few times. I would think you could use yeast until the volume of "trub" is ridiculus, or until you need a different strain of yeast.

 

[medic_35057]

For those of you that do this often, how many times can your reuse the yeast cake without separating the yeast from the trub?

I have read that people recommend reusing a yeast cake only up to 4 times. Has to do with mutations of the yeast. I don't know if that is true or not.
I reused a yeast cake from my blue moon clone and dumped a hoegaarden clone on top of it and had activity within 3 to 4 hours. It is nice to be able to save a few bucks when making a new batch that can be dumped onto an appropriate yeast cake.

 

[Moonpile]

My buddies and I are brewing later today and pitching on a yeast cake from another beer that we're going to bottle tonight too. This is our first time trying it.

Isn't the real benefit that you're pitching onto a very large amount of yeast so you should have a quick and complete ferm?

It seems to me like it would be a good idea to start with a low to medium gravity beer and to pitch a higher gravity beer on the yeast cake from the lower gravity one.

I'm already envisioning IPA to ridiculously high grav barleywine!

Moon

 

[mjm76]

I have had wild results when pitching onto a yeast cake. I have done it twice now and both times, had very vigorous and quick fermentations. MAKE SURE TO USE A BLOW OFF. you will need it. I learned that the hard way the first time I pitched onto a yeast cake.

 

[mykayel]

On Sunday afternoon, racked my Kolsch into secondary. On uwmqdman's sage advice, decided to reuse the yeast cake with an Oktoberfest-esque pseudo-lager, and picked up the Oktoberfest Marzen PM kit from Midwest supplies, sans yeast. Brewing day went great, OG = 1.052, and by bedtime there was some big time activity in the fermenter. By Monday morning it looked like someone dropped an M80 in that sucker - hooray for blow off tubes. This evening, I was freaking out a little cuz fermentation had slowed considerably, to about an airlock bubble every 5 sec, but an SG of 1.012 soothed my mind. And it tastes GOOD! Still has a way to go obviously, but I can't wait to crack that first bottle this summer. I think it's safe to say - no more extract-only brewing for this guy. And AG is on the horizon. And Go Brewers!

That's exactly what I'm planning on doing... making Kolsch to drink this summer and then after its done fermenting making a seudo Oktoberfest from the same yeast. Do you mind sharingthe recipes you used.

 

[rra24403]

I been thinking about trying this.
Where is a good thread to know how to use primary trub for yeast?
How much to you need for 5 gal patch?
Thanks

 

[GoBrewers]

That's exactly what I'm planning on doing... making Kolsch to drink this summer and then after its done fermenting making a seudo Oktoberfest from the same yeast. Do you mind sharingthe recipes you used.

I used 3.3 lbs. of Amber Malt Extract (LME), 1.4 lbs Pale malt extract (LME), 4 lbs. German Pilsner malt, 19 oz. of Specialty grains.

Mashed the grains in a 5 gallon paint strainer at 150F for 75 minutes, right in the boil kettle in 2.5 gallons H20. Moved the bag to a strainer and sparged with 2.5 gal 170F sparge water.

Added H20 to 6 gal in kettle for boil.
Boil Add'ns:
1 oz Hallertauer pellet 60 min
1 oz Hallertauer pellet 15 min
LME at 15 min
1 Irish moss tab 15 min
1 oz Tettnanger pellet 2 min

Chilled to 65, then pitched onto Kolsch cake. I had racked the Kolsch to secondary during the boil, after the hot break. Stick in a blow off tube and watch the fireworks.

Happy Brewing!