I trust you H. Brewers...

[RexPDX]

My FIRST beer is conditioning in the bottles.

On to the next.

I plan I brewing this recipe from Clone Brews tomorrow --> Saison

The owner of the LHBS I went to said I could use White Labs Pitchable Abbey Ale Yeast (530) without a starter. He said just give it a good shake a few hours before pitch and leave it in room temperature. Here is what I found with the googler --> 530

Should I trust this? I'll have just under a cup of DME left over from this recipe... should I make a starter? And if so... how?

 

[jacefive]

I've used white labs with or without a starter, he is not wrong. But it's never a bad idea.

http://www.beerdude.com/yeast_starter.shtml

 

[itsme6582]

Here are a couple of sites you might be interested in...

http://tinyurl.com/
http://www.shorturl.com/

 

[Revvy]

Sorry, but unless you are making a beer with an og of 1.020, you were given crappy advice from your lhbs...

Liquid yeast, regardless of where it comes from, a tube, a smack pack, a slant, the dregs of a couple of bottle conditioned beers, OR that mason jar at the back of your fridge from a year ago, Should have a starter made REGARDLESS of the og of the beer. Yes Mr Malty says that for beers at 1.020 and below you have plenty of yeast, if you make a starter you'll have peace of mind.

And you won't be starting an "is my yeast dead" thread in a couple of days.

Making a starter first insures that your yeast is still alive and viable before you dump it in your beer. You will be less likely to start one of those "is my yeast dead?" threads that are on here every day.

You will also ensure that you have enough yeast usually the tubes and smack packs are a lot less yeast that you really should use for healthy fermentation.

Making a starter also usually means your beer will take off sooner, because the first thing that the little buggers do in the presence of wort (whether in a flask or in a fermenter) is have an orgy to reproduce enough cells to do the job...So it won't take such a long time in the fermenter since they started doing it in the flask.

Additionally it is better for the yeast to consume and reproduce incrementally rather than just dumping them into the fermenter...The yeast will be less stressed out than if you just dump them in.

Stressed out yeast can lead to a lot of off flavors...maybe even (though rare) the dreaded autolysis....Or the curse of 1.030....getting a stuck fermentation because the yeast have bit the dust.

So making a starter proves your yeast is still healthy, allows you to grow enough yeast to do the job, cuts down on lag time, and ensures that you will not get off flavors or stuck ferementations from stressed out yeast.

FYI, you don't need to wait till your smack pack expands to make a starter though.

 

[RyanPDX]

Just curious what LHBS that was that gave that advice. I usually get my stuff from Main street in Hillsboro. When I inquired about making a starter, they said it was pretty much always a good idea, as has been said on this forum. First time I used liquid yeast, Belgian wit, I didn't make a starter and thought I did something wrong as it took almost 4 days to see any activity. Since then its been all starters. The IPA I made last week took off about 6 hours after I pitched the yeast.

 

[dracus]

I'd be really concerned about that lhbs. Not only did they potentially sabotage a beer you're brewing they lost out on a Crap ton of money.

1. A flask
2. More dme or lme
3. Maybe more yeast
4. Stir plate
5. Future beer sales.

Don't get me wrong the marketing on both white labs and wyeast tout the ability to Pitch strait into 5g. Its easy for someone at the lhbs who doesn't brew seriously to just say its fine.

I know my lhbs often favors wyeast because of the idea you don't have to make a starter. Yet when asked "whould you?" they say I always make a starter.

 

[RyanPDX]

I'd be really concerned about that lhbs. Not only did they potentially sabotage a beer you're brewing they lost out on a Crap ton of money.

1. A flask
2. More dme or lme
3. Maybe more yeast
4.

Yeah that first time I got my stuff to make a starter, I prolly spent an extra $20 or so.

 

[RexPDX]

Thank you all so much for the great replies. This is definitely one of the most important lessons I've learned so far.

I'm surprised I got this advice- I checked the White Labs FAQ and this is what I found.

While a starter is not always necessary, White Labs recommends making a starter if the Original Gravity is over 1.060, if the yeast is past its "Best Before" date, if you are pitching lager yeast at temperatures below 65F, or if a faster start is desired.

So this sounds like it is old news to all of you. I wonder why my LHBS didn't give me a heads up?

Anyway, it is brew day (hopefully). My question is, is it too late to make a starter? I figure the yeast would get a least 6-7 hours of quality orgy time in before pitching. Is this pointless?

Also, here are the starter instructions from the White Labs FAQ. Sound about right?

Procedure:

In a medium sauce pan, add 2 pints of water and 1 cup Dried Malt Extract (DME). Mix well and boil the solution for about 10 minutes to sterilize. Cover and cool the pan to room temperature in an ice bath. This will give you a wort of approximately 1.040 OG. Keeping the Original Gravity low is important because you want to keep the yeast in its growth phase, rather than its fermentation phase. The fermentation phase will create alcohol which can be toxic to yeast in high concentrations.

Pour the wort into a sanitized glass container (flask, growler, etc.) and pitch the vial of yeast. Cover the top of the container with a sanitized piece of aluminum foil so that it is flush with the container, but will still allow CO2 to escape. Vigorously shake or swirl the container to get as much oxygen dissolved in the solution as possible. Allow the starter to sit at room temperature for 12-24 hours, occasionally shaking it to keep the solution aerated.

You guys rock.

 

[Revvy]

Thank you all so much for the great replies. This is definitely one of the most important lessons I've learned so far.

I'm surprised I got this advice- I checked the White Labs FAQ and this is what I found.



So this sounds like it is old news to all of you. I wonder why my LHBS didn't give me a heads up?

Anyway, it is brew day (hopefully). My question is, is it too late to make a starter? I figure the yeast would get a least 6-7 hours of quality orgy time in before pitching. Is this pointless?

Also, here are the starter instructions from the White Labs FAQ. Sound about right?



You guys rock.

Actually whitelabs advice is old news...not ours.....

If you go by Jamil's mr malty calculator and the LATEST data you will understand that sometimes the corporate party line is NOT the best information. Just look at kit instructions that advocate racking or bottling after 5 days...

You're not the first new brewer asking about the discrepency....

This thread I think answers it pretty well..

https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f39/mr-malty-wants-more-yeast-than-manufacturer-149962/

And like I said, in my post above, there are OTHER reasons to make a starter besides just raising the cell count....

IT PROVES TO YOU THAT YOUR YEAST IT NOT DEAD!!!!!!!

Then if there is no airlock activity, or there is lag time, you can ruleout that your yeast was bad...because you had made a starter, and it wouldn't have reproduced if the yeast was "dead" or "bad."

You KNOW that is not the case.

And also like I said, it cuts down on lagtime...because the orgy has already started in your starter vessel...so the timeframe you have to wait for them to start working is reduced because they are already working.

Places like this, and the podcasts, stuff by Jamil, and other brewers is where the most up to date brewing wisdom and ideas can be found...In fact a lot of stuff has been started on here, and made it into byo or zymurgy or podcasts...in fact BYO DID a piece on no secondary/long primary, along with the BASIC BREWING PODCAST and even they said that there were no issues/harm with doing it and in some beers it did actually improve the flavor and clarity. And I believe that really WAS influenced by the discussion we have had for the last couple years on here.

The manufacturers may MAKE the products but we use them, thousands of us on here, sharing our experiences and coming up with new insights, and thinking out of the box, just by the sheer numbers of highly active, and even award winning brewers, and even brewing scholars like Kai, who are at the cutting edge of things.

 

[RexPDX]

You are awesome, Revvy. I'm going to make a starter and pitch later today and hope for the best. I know this time frame is not ideal and will vow to nail my starter the next go around.

Cheers!

 

[remilard]

There is what is acceptable and then there is what is optimal. A single White Labs tube is not optimal for that beer, it might be acceptable to you, it is acceptable to your LHBS guy, it is not acceptable to me.

It's not really even a modern data thing, Jamil is repeating pitching rates from Fix's work and Fix was repeating common commercial pitching rates from industry literature. Those numbers (~1 million cells per ml per degree plato) go back to the 80s at least.

 

[Revvy]

Oh and I agree with you about starting the starter, I often only get 8-12 hours on a starter. I beleive it's better to have a started starter than no starter at all. Because at least the are a bit more awake then if they were in a tube or smack pack....

 

[Lupy]

Should a starter show signs of life in less than 12hrs?
I'm not sure mine have, though I have only made a few.
Regardless, it makes sense to pitch a young starter rather than just rely on a single vial/pack.
Thank goodness for extra runnings.

 

[RexPDX]

Should a starter show signs of life in less than 12hrs?
I'm not sure mine have, though I have only made a few.
Regardless, it makes sense to pitch a young starter rather than just rely on a single vial/pack.
Thank goodness for extra runnings.

Well, its been about 4.5 hours since I made my starter and there is some serious activity going on. The yeast are churning around and a foamy head is forming at the surface. They should be making their way to the wort in about an hour and a half. We shall see...

 

[Lupy]

Well, its been about 4.5 hours since I made my starter and there is some serious activity going on. The yeast are churning around and a foamy head is forming at the surface. They should be making their way to the wort in about an hour and a half. We shall see...

Sounds like they're alive and well.
Mayhaps I just need to pay closer attention.
Brew-on! neighbor.

 

[RexPDX]

Sounds like they're alive and well.
Mayhaps I just need to pay closer attention.
Brew-on! neighbor.

Right on! East side!:rockin:

 

[RexPDX]

I want to thank you all again for your the great advice, and I'd like to thank my yeast for being little asexually reproducing freaks. As I said earlier, I made a starter and pitched about 6 hours later. The starter was healthy and churning up some heavy foam before pitching. I don't really care so much if making the starter on brewing day made much (if any difference), I'm just glad I finally broke the ice and actually made one. It was so much easier than I ever imagined. The visible fermentation (foam and furious airlock action) kicked in somewhere between 12 and 24 hours after pitching and is still going strong. Not bad at all. But I imagine I'll have better results and a smoother fermentation next time when I give the starter proper time to do its thing.