doodoobutter
Active Member
Update, read post #7.
I have a lot of grain from a bulk buy to get through before it gets cold outside (north east). I use california ale yeast from white labs for a large portion of our recipes. I want to take a vile, and make a bunch from it to store. After some reading, this is the plan that I came up with, I took what I needed from different turorials:
I'm going summarize so this doesn't turn into a novel, let me know if you need more info.
1) Split vial into (2) 1 gallon glass jugs, filled with 4oz dme and 1 qt water each. Basic starter gravity.
2) After 48 hours, add another 4oz dme and 1qt water.
3) After 48 hours, add another 4oz dme and 1 qt water.
4) Let finish fermenting for a few more days.
5) Boil some 8oz Ball jars and lids. When I take them out, leave about half full of water and screw on the tops while hot.
6) Cold crash starters for a day or 2. Then take them out and decant 90% of the spent wort. Then swirl the slurry around to make it somewhat homogeneous. Use it to top off the jars that are half filled with sterile water.
7) Refrigerate my little bottles of yeast. Then take one out 48 hours before brew day, and make a starter.
Ok, this looks good to me except one thing I came across while researching, botulism. I know it has come up before with boiling wort for storage instead of using a pressure cooker. But I feel like I might be doing something a little unique here. I could just store the yeast in its own spent wort, and that would be as safe as storing beer. But I thought that storing it in sterile water would be more healthy for the yeast, as opposed to storing it in it's own spent wort which contains some alcohol. Buuuut, sterile water is going to have a higher ph than spent wort, putting into botulism territory.
Am I looking into this too much? If there is a risk of botulism, I'll just store on spent wort and get a pressure cooker in the spring when we start brewing again.
I should also note that I left out a lot of my sanitary procedures in the steps.
I have a lot of grain from a bulk buy to get through before it gets cold outside (north east). I use california ale yeast from white labs for a large portion of our recipes. I want to take a vile, and make a bunch from it to store. After some reading, this is the plan that I came up with, I took what I needed from different turorials:
I'm going summarize so this doesn't turn into a novel, let me know if you need more info.
1) Split vial into (2) 1 gallon glass jugs, filled with 4oz dme and 1 qt water each. Basic starter gravity.
2) After 48 hours, add another 4oz dme and 1qt water.
3) After 48 hours, add another 4oz dme and 1 qt water.
4) Let finish fermenting for a few more days.
5) Boil some 8oz Ball jars and lids. When I take them out, leave about half full of water and screw on the tops while hot.
6) Cold crash starters for a day or 2. Then take them out and decant 90% of the spent wort. Then swirl the slurry around to make it somewhat homogeneous. Use it to top off the jars that are half filled with sterile water.
7) Refrigerate my little bottles of yeast. Then take one out 48 hours before brew day, and make a starter.
Ok, this looks good to me except one thing I came across while researching, botulism. I know it has come up before with boiling wort for storage instead of using a pressure cooker. But I feel like I might be doing something a little unique here. I could just store the yeast in its own spent wort, and that would be as safe as storing beer. But I thought that storing it in sterile water would be more healthy for the yeast, as opposed to storing it in it's own spent wort which contains some alcohol. Buuuut, sterile water is going to have a higher ph than spent wort, putting into botulism territory.
Am I looking into this too much? If there is a risk of botulism, I'll just store on spent wort and get a pressure cooker in the spring when we start brewing again.
I should also note that I left out a lot of my sanitary procedures in the steps.