salvaging my dubbel

[justenoughforme]

... so as in other posts, i ordered white labs belgian strong ale and it came totally cooked, starter never even showed signs of life. (100g dme in 1 litre water)

since i had my brew all ready i went into the cellar and got several bottles of a previous trappist clone with a lot of lees,

i drank 3/4 of each and added the rest to my brew.

there is airlock activity, but it's very weak. should i leave it or try and get a real yeast to re pitch asap ?

any problem with unintentionally re using yeast? this isn't from a yeast cake, this is out of the bottom of a bottle. they had a pretty good layer though.

 

[javaking]

Sounds interesting, I'm just subbing to hear what everyone has to say. Good luck!

 

[m00ps]

I think you need tp repitch asap. The amount of yeast in those bottles is tiny. You would need like more than a case to ferment a dubbel. And thats assuming the yeast in those bottles was healthy and young, which is likely wasnt.

You could try stepping up a starter from the dreg, but either way, you need to get something fermenting that wort fast

 

[justenoughforme]

last time i did this i paid for 2'nd day air and my yeast cooked in the mailbox all day while i was at work.

looks like i need to make the drive to a lhbs. or try once more with mail order, it's like 1.5 - 2 hours to my nearest brew shop

 

[m00ps]

I'd try making a starter from some dregs. You could have like a 1L in a day or two if you do it right

 

[justenoughforme]

and it's a good excuse to drink my trappist clone a little early.

 

[beergolf]

Get some new yeast asap. The dregs from a few bottles will no where be enough to ferment out a dubbel. It will be much bettervto get some healthy yeast in there as soon as you can. Underpitching that much will cause some serious off flavors.

 

[asterix404]

You learned a very valuable lesson. Don't have liquid yeast shipped to your house. Dry yeast is relatively okay but liquid yeast is a nightmare. You do need more yeast and depending on strength, you might need 3 packages but at least 2. What was your OG?

 

[justenoughforme]

well i have foaming in my starter of salvaged saffbrew abbeye yeast.

i got up to about six thick lees in there, and added DME/water mix, and i see bubble. will re pith (third pitch now) tomorrow. unless people say just do it now.

 

[IslandLizard]

You learned a very valuable lesson. Don't have liquid yeast shipped to your house. Dry yeast is relatively okay but liquid yeast is a nightmare. You do need more yeast and depending on strength, you might need 3 packages but at least 2. What was your OG?

Nightmare? Not necessarily.
Time of year is important. If I need yeast shipped, April and early May are the season for that, as are early Fall shipments. We can have a pretty good idea what weather to expect along a route, thanks to the innuhnet. As long as there are no extreme hot or cold zones in between, and weekend overlays involved, it is doable.

I've said this already in the other thread. Parallel threads are a waste of everyone's time... And the OP still has no location disclosed, so we can just keep guessing, while browsing back and forth. <ugh>

Agreed on more yeast is needed and soon. I didn't think anyone would start brewing a batch knowing the yeast was cooked, and not having a backup on hand. Just stumbled on this (2nd) thread on the same issue basically.

 

[justenoughforme]

well i have lots of foam and krausen, so apparently the Lees from my previous batches are doing their thing.


i live in rural indiana, do be honest i never saw where to put that in when i registered.

i dont think it was the transit so much as 8 hours in a black metal mailbox in the sun.

 

[asterix404]

Liquid yeast is exceptionally fragile. If it is too cold, it dies. If it is too hot, it dies. You do not know the temps of any of the trucks or of the facilities where it is all sorted. In the winter, my guess is that it is very cold. In the summer, it is too hot. If the package is left out awaiting people coming home, in the sun, the yeast can die.

Typically places will ship with ice packs but when I did purchase yeast online, the ice was warm by the time it got to my house... with 2 day shipping. Basically, I spend close to 25$ on a packet of liquid yeast or two, and ended up tossing it all because it was all dead.

This is actually why LHBS are so good. Their ordering meets a lot of criteria for yeasts and typically they store them well too. I have had nothing but terrible luck with liquid yeasts sent through the mail and a lot of my friends have too.

 

[justenoughforme]

i found out my "local" brew store has white labs, both trappist and abbey. guess i'm making an hour and a half drive tomorrow.

off topic, but anyone know the real difference between the two ? i understand trappist beers and monestaries ... but abbey ale is the same style of ale isnt it ?

 

[beergolf]

The difference is just the strain. The Trappist is the Chimay strain and the Abbey is the Westmalle strain.

 

[m00ps]

The chimay strain is the fruitiest of all the trappist strains, a bit too much for me at times. The westmalle strain is more of a balance between fruit and spice, I think it also attenuates a bit more

 

[ibrewmyown]

How many gallons and at what O.G. did you brew? Not that it matters too much as I would have pitched some new yeasts as soon as possible. If you are talking about a couple of gallons your dregs may catch up but if your talking about 5 gallons of 1.080 wort that may be another story but you never know. Hell, there's beer brewed with airborne yeast! Then again, what you see fermenting could already be some wild yeast strain????

Obviously pitching good healthy yeast to get the fermentation going as quick as possible gives you the best chance at success but its not out of the realm to think that what you did could still work. Its just that you're pushing the limits a bit.

Good luck and let us know how it turns out.

 

[justenoughforme]

well my FG is steady at 1.015, i'm going to leave it a few more weeks before i bottle

OG was 1.075


i'm so curious to see if it tastes even close to right