6 month old White Labs Yeast

tgolanos · Feb 7, 2016

I went to my LHBS to buy some sanitizer and ended up also buying an old vial of White Labs Budejovice Czech Lager yeast. Because its best before date was 15 December, the guy at the LBHS gave me the vial for $6 (liquid yeast normally runs about $15 in these parts), so I'm not really complaining. I plan on making a starter with it. A few questions beforehand, though:

Is there a way I can estimate the viability of this yeast? It's just under 6 months old and Brewer's Friend is telling me it has 0% viability, which I don't necessarily believe.

I plan on making a multi-step starter before I use the yeast but I don't have a stir plate. If I make the starter in a large enough container and just shake the f*!% out of it every few hours, will this give the yeast enough oxygen or would it be better to leave it be as it propagates?

lowtones84 · Feb 7, 2016

You don't even need to shake the f*!% out of it. Would a stir plate be helpful? Sure, but just swirl it up a bit here and there as you walk by. It's certainly not 0% viability, you should be fine with a multi-step starter.

pricelessbrewing · Feb 7, 2016

What I would do? 250mL starter at 1.020. Shake the living crap out of it initially, then every once in awhile to degas. Give it 3 days. Then I would cold crash for 24 hours decant, and top off to whatever size starter is needed according to the calculator at brewunited.

RM-MN · Feb 7, 2016

Woodland Brewing Research has done some studies on yeast viability over time and yeast growth in starters. I find that these studies come to different conclusions than what is reported by Brewers friend and other calcuators. Take a look at these two articles and see what they concluded.

http://www.woodlandbrew.com/2012/12/refrigeration-effects-on-yeast-viability.html
http://www.woodlandbrew.com/2015/02/yeast-starters-stirred-vs-not.html

pricelessbrewing · Feb 7, 2016

RM-MN said:
Woodland Brewing Research has done some studies on yeast viability over time and yeast growth in starters. I find that these studies come to different conclusions than what is reported by Brewers friend and other calcuators. Take a look at these two articles and see what they concluded.

http://www.woodlandbrew.com/2012/12/refrigeration-effects-on-yeast-viability.html
http://www.woodlandbrew.com/2015/02/yeast-starters-stirred-vs-not.html

Agreed. I'm not a fan of Mr. Malty's yeast data at all, he never published it for one thing, has absolutely no verification at all.

tgolanos · Feb 8, 2016

RM-MN said:
Woodland Brewing Research has done some studies on yeast viability over time and yeast growth in starters. I find that these studies come to different conclusions than what is reported by Brewers friend and other calcuators. Take a look at these two articles and see what they concluded.

http://www.woodlandbrew.com/2012/12/refrigeration-effects-on-yeast-viability.html
http://www.woodlandbrew.com/2015/02/yeast-starters-stirred-vs-not.html

These were great reads, they both actually made sense. Put some things into perspective about making starters without a stir plate and yeast growth. Thanks for posting them.