Brewing with Wyeast 3724 Belgian Saison

[sven945]

I brewed this saison yesterday, cooled in the bath to 25°C (77°F) and pitched. Without really thinking, I left it in the bath overnight and it dropped to 18°C (64°F), which is a bit of a bugger. This morning I attached it to my heat belt currently set at about 20.5°C, which I'll raise slowly over the next few days. I hope I've not ruined it by letting it drop straight after pitching. I'll make sure it doesn't drop at all in the FV.

EDIT: I made a roughly 1 litre starter, for about 18 hours, then put it in the fridge to settle and poured off the excess, then brought it back up to room temperature before pitching. There's about 13 litres in the FV, and the OG is 1057.

 

[sven945]

Well it seems to be doing fine after a week. I've been increasing the temperature by about a degree centigrade a day, and it's 26.5ºC at the moment (80ºF). I've taken a gravity reading and it's 1016. I'm going to leave it another week before racking it to my secondary fermenter with brett, and I'll hopefully bottle anything that doesn't fit in my glass carbouy.

 

[sirjoel]

It will finish on its own, but will take a while. If you really need to finish quickly, make a starter of 3711 and pitch at high krausen.

What does it mean to "pitch at high krausen"? Does that just mean to pitch the starter when its at peak fermentation (i.e. lots of krausen) instead of letting it finish out? I usually make my starters a few days in advance so any potential issues if I crash it in the fridge at high krausen and use it a few days later? Thanks.