Starter for every batch

After reading a lot, I have still a few questions...

I'm a proud owner of a stir plate and a flask and I'm willing to use this setup. Does it make sense to make a starter for all my batches, even a smaller beer? I mean is there any downside I did not notice?

Can I make starters with try or liquid yeast?

Thanks again for the help!

 

Do not make starters for dry yeast it is unnecessary as 1 packet of dry yeast is plenty for a 5 gallon batch of almost any beer up to OG 1.075 or so.

For liquid yeast you should always make a starter. There are 3 times less active yeast cultures in liquid yeast (100 million) and thus need a starter to build numbers as well as get the yeast active.

 

So why would someone use liquid yeast? Better taste?

 

For dry just rehydrate and pitch.

Liquid i would say yes always make a starter even if its a small beer. Make a starter and make it larger than you need. After you make more yeast with the starter, save some in a mason jar for another batch.

Its just preference on dry or liquid. You also have more choices of yeast with liquid. I keep some dry on hand as a back up but prefer liquid yeast. i made a starter for some WLP090 yeast and i guess i had it in the fridge too long (many months) cause they were all dead and the starter failed so i had to use my US05 dry yeast for the beer i made yesterday.

 

You are missing a B there.

"The actual counts now range from 70–130 billion," says Chris White, president of White Labs." (link)

 

When doing a beer like this one:
5 gallons – 18IBUs – 1.071 OG – Est ABV 7.0%

2 x Briess Pilsen LME
1 x Briess Pilsen DME
1 x Candi Sugar
2 x Saaz (1oz)
1 x Abbaye Dried Yeast

Should I just rehydrate the dry yeast even if this is a bigger beer? Would it hurt making a starter from dry and keeping some for later in the fridge?

Would it be better to go with liquid and a starter in this case?

 

On bigger beers, I would just pick up an extra packet of dry yeast. I have read a lot on here that says the reason you don't want to use a starter for dry yeast, is that it's actually detrimental to the yeast. They are designed to be rehydrated. So when you use a starter, you actually can kill off up to half of the viable cells.

I have no proof of this, other than what I've read on this board, but those posts had some pretty solid facts behind them. It also seems to be the consensus here that for the price, just buy and extra pack of dry as it would be almost the same cost, plus extra time to do the starter.

 

Makes sense Clonefan94.

 

Pitching dry yeast directly into wort is what causes the 50% die-off. That is straight from Chris White in Yeast. If you rehydrate it first, you can pitch it into a starter and not suffer from the die-off. Most people don't bother with starters for dry yeast because a) usually one packet is enough (especially if rehydrated first); and b) the cost for dry is about half that of liquid and for about the same cost of a liquid vial, you can purchase two packs of dry and call it a day. Once dry yeast has been rehydrated, it effectively becomes liquid yeast. If you want to make a starter, there's no harm in doing so.

 

From everything I have read, with dry yeast, do NOT make a starter. There is some dye off, but the yeast is dehydrated with the various minerals and such forth that they need for good strong growth. If you make a starter, it actually consumes all of this. Now you CAN make a starter out of it if you need to make a REALLY big beer, but since 1 packet of dry yeast is generally enough for 5 gallons at 1.05-1.06OG range if rehydrated first, you'd need to make a pretty big starter to better this. There are a lot more cells in dry yeast than in a vial of liquid yeast.

To double cell counts you'd need something like a 2 liter starter with a stir plate for a packet of dry yeast. For liquid yeast, a 1 liter starter with a stir plate roughly doubles the cell counts, because there are fewer cells to start with (very rough numbers).

A 2 liter 1.04OG starter for a packet of dry yeast is probably going to cost you almost as much in DME costs as just getting a 2nd packet of dry yeast and it is certainly a lot less trouble for potentially saving $1-2 in the end.

Liquid yeast has the benefit that there are something like 100 varieties of liquid yeast out there. There are only something like a dozen varieties of dry yeast. I haven't been using liquid yeasts much, but so far with the bit I have, S-05 is still pretty close to my go to for "standard" ales, but for lagers I deffinitely like the liquid yeasts better than either of the dry lager yeasts I've used, not that either are bad.

The other part there is, lagers need so MANY yeast cells, that unless you are making a small lager, like a 1.05OG lager and 2-3 gallons of it, you really need at least 2 or 3 packets of dry yeast (or making 5 gallons of a BIG lager, like a 1.08OG IPL or a 1.1 Imperial Pilsner or something where you might need 3-4 packets) it almost just makes sense to go liquid, as you are going to need a BUNCH of whatever you are pitching, so either several dry yeast packets (which adds up) or stepping up a liquid yeast culture a couple of times you might as well go in for the extra variety of the liquid yeast.

One way I've found to rehydrate liquid yeast that seems to be "the best" is to sanitize my 1l flask quick, then toss the yeast packet in there with the bit of warm water (I usually boil it, pour it in and then let it cool to the right temp range), swirl it up some and wait 15-20 minutes. I then take my sanitized 1/2 cup measure and pour half a cup of wort in to the flask, swirl it around and then dump it in to my carboy.

If I rehydrate in a bowl or what not, I tend to get sticky yeast that won't come off, even if I pour a little wort in to the bowl to thin it. Being able to reall swish and swirl everything in the flask "dissolves" the yeast in to the wort mix soooo much better. Otherwise it seems like I easily lose a good 20% of my yeast to being stuck to the bowl.

 

Thanks for the long answer!

So I guess I could replace Safbrew Belgian Abbaye Ale Dry Yeast (11.5 g) by Wyeast 1214 Belgian Abbey Ale Yeast for the beer mentioned above, right?

 

You could. I haven't used either so I can't comment who similar the resultant beers would be.

At some point I need to do some yeasts tests where I brew up 4-5 gallons of something and then use 3-4 different yeasts that are all "similar" in different carboys to see what differences I can notice in the resulting beer. Then take copious notes.

I kind of need to do the same with hops too. Malts I have down pretty well the flavor and body differences imparted by different ones and I have some of the differences in hops down (especially the handful of my most used ones, like Fuggle, Cascade, Columbus, Hallertau, Saaz), but I'd really like to have better notes and more variety to try in hops and yeast so I have a better handle on what I want to use in recipes.

Otherwise I am mostly doing a bit of reading other people's notes on the ingredients and some of my own experience (possibly not with that specific yeast or hops). Its worked pretty well, but I can't imagine it wouldn't hurt to have a better handle things, especially trying ones I have never used before.

 

I make starters with dry yeast all the time. They're called "1 gallon batches of beer."

Collect the yeast cake in a Mason jar and pitch the whole thing into a 5 gallon batch.

 

Poor advice here. There's no magic to dry versus liquid. There are proper pitching rates and improper. Pitch 200 billion dry yeast cells directly into 5 gal of wort and approximately half die and you're under pitching ANY beer. Pitch 2 packs of dry yeast, 1/2 die, you have 200 billion left and you have a potentially laggy, but correctly pitched fermentation for an OG up to about 1.060.

Making a starter with dry yeast will allow you to activate the yeast which will still die approx. 50% on contact to the wort but allow the remaining to get active and propagate to a certain degree. By making a starter with one pack of dry yeast you accomplish the same as a starter with liquid for 1/2 the cost overall. Both active with closer to correct pitching rates.

As far as nutrients for a healthy ferment, that should be supplied by the brewer by means of water, grain, and/or yeast nutrient added to the kettle. You can't tell me you believe there are some nutrients IN the dry yeast pack which will be consumed by the yeast in the starter (which there are none) and this will somehow be detrimental to your ferment because this minute amount of nutrients is not 'present' for the main ferment??

If you want to make the best beers, you pay attention to making every detail as perfect as possible ESPECIALLY yeast.

Provide:
1) Proper pitching rates
2) Proper aeration
3) Proper nutrients (Ca, Mg)
4) Of course ferment temp.

 

1) More cell potential via making a starter.
2) More variety; more choice.

 

For 5 gallon batches I always use an appropriately sized starter if using a liquid yeast. There is nothing to be lost and everything to be gained by endeavoring to pitch the correct amount of healthy yeast into your sweet wort.

If using a dry yeast there is little to be gained and potential for deterioration of the yeast the manufacturers have so carefully prepared by using a starter. Financially there is no benefit either. The cost of 200g of DME for a 2L starter or the cost of a second pack of dry yeast. Follow the company's guidelines for rehydration if you care about not killing 50% of your yeast immediately at pitching. I take the science at face value on this point and see no reason not to follow the easy steps involved in re-hydration. Again pitching enough healthy yeast to facilitate a more optimal fermentation is the goal.

If you keep the yeast happy you will have the potential to make a beer closer to what you wanted in terms of flavor, balance, ABV etc. As an added bonus, if you decide to harvest yeast, that which you harvest will have been subjected to fewer stresses than yeast not so well managed. The result is likely to be a more optimal fermentation the next time this harvested yeast is used.

 

This sounds in the main, like excellent advice to me.

 

yeastcalc.co tells me 240 billions cells needed for the above beer, so more than one pack of try yeast is needed. The brewshop is selling this kit with just one bag. :-(

 

I know it is a bit of cognitive dissonance after all that's gone before, but I would stick with 1 pack of correctly re-hydrated dry yeast. for a 5 gallon batch of OG under 1.060. Pitching 2, packs won't cause you problems though.


Edit: just looked at the recipe. That is a big beer. I would pitch 2 packs. My numbers are also wrong. Deleted my calculation. Sorry about that.

 

Take it for what it's worth but I've brewed over 30 batches of homebrew. All were either good or excellent with the exception of 1 batch.

That 1 bad batch I used 1 dry yeast pack for 10 gallons of wort. I rehydrated the yeast and pitched it to a 2L starter at 1.040 OG. Once the foam started to fall I pitched half of the starter to each fermenter. This beer came out horrible and I had perfect temp control I dumped half of it. I vowed never again to make a starter for dry yeast and haven't had a problem since.

The main reason to use Liquid yeast is you have about 10X more yeast choices available.

 

I have to say that I'm overwhelmed by your support. I'm feeling very confident brewing with such a strong support in the background. Thanks guys!

 

Before you say bad things about the brew shop selling you less yeast than you need, read this article about pitch rates, paying close attention to the pitch rates used. http://sciencebrewer.com/2012/03/02/pitching-rate-experiment-part-deux-results/

 

Very interesting read!

 

I made a real nice American Lager with sf23 dry yeast. One pack from the hbs in their boxed all grain kit. Re hydrated it and pitched 48 degrees. It plowed right thru using Brulosophers quick lager method. No starter and one pack. Made another with part of the slurry. When I bottled it I saved it again. Now I have three real nice jars ready for three more batch's. Always save your yeast, it knocks off 5 to 10 dollars a batch.

 

Why not just rehydrate and skip the whole die-off and need for a starter when using dry yeast?

This was taken directly from the data sheet at the Danstar site.

"Sprinkle the yeast directly on the surface of 10 times it's weight of clean sterilized (boiled) water at 30 - 35 ˚C. Do not use wort, or distilled or reverse osmosis water as loss in viability might result."

"Yeast has been conditioned to survive rehydration. The yeast contains and adequate reservoir of carbohydrates and unsaturated fatty acids to achieve active growth. It is unnecessary to aerate wort."

 

More variety of yeast mainly.

 

Wyeast 1214

You mentioned you were thinking about using this yeast earlier in the thread.

I have used it once. It is the Chimay strain and a very slow starting yeast. If using it make a correctly sized starter and give it plenty of time to get going prior to brew day.

If using it again for a Saturday brew I would prep a starter (2l) on the Monday night to allow 2-3 days to ferment and a 2 days to chill. Decant the foul starter wort and pitch on brewday.

The One batch I used it in had that typical Chimay yeast flavor to it. Northern Brewer's La petite orange Blanche.