Critique my Homemade Mongrel Super Yeast Nutrient

[Asmarino]

I cannot source any yeast nutrient or yeast foods or any such stuff. There just aren’t any homebrew stores around, so I’ve resorted to making my own based off of several articles that I read on how you can make them yourself.

The base components are, of course, malt (since beer never seems to actually need nutrients) and boiled bread yeast (BBY). The actual process and ingredients are as follows:

• Started with about a ¼ a kilo (½ lb.) of traditional malted barley (malted then sundried) then forgotten in an empty NIDO can for a year or so, so not sweet on the tongue when chewed. I roasted it lightly on a frying pan on the stove till slightly golden though several started popping like popcorn and it smelled like biscuits
• Crushed them gently with a pin roll (that thing you flatten pizza dough with) till they were chipped but before they were pulverized into powder (we’re not aiming for porridge here)
• Put it in with a liter and a half (~6.5 cups) of water in a LARGE saucepan and bring it to a boil. (Don’t use a small saucepan with a hole at the side that makes you lose a third of what you made, just don’t)
• After it’s been boiling for 20 mins, add 250 grams (½ lb.) of dark raisins that you roughly chopped up and continue to boil.
• Add 11 grams (~ ½ ounce) of bread yeast to the boil and start fighting off the boil over with a spoon. Any spoon will do, the boiling wort (because that’s what this is) will sanitise it.
• Add the zest of 2 (nearly dried) oranges for acidity and some vitamin C as well as a ¼ of a tomato that’s been chopped to paste (YAN source, or at least tomato paste is, which I didn’t have, and didn’t want to buy in case it contained sorbates) to this brew
• Forget to add a teabag for tannin and an 1/8th of a banana because you’re muddleheaded and the toddler wants to play (and so did I)
• After this monstrosity has been boiling for an hour, take it off the fire, cover and let cool overnight.
• Filter with a wide sieve that traps the spent grains, the raisins and the zest but allows the yeast slurry to pass
• Add ½ a liter of boiled water to replace the wort you spilled overnight that your wife is making you clean up and put it in a 1½ liter plastic bottle and freeze till it’s needed
• Add 100ml (~6.5 tablespoons) of this ... stuff to 900 ml of water and 1 liter (dear Americans, that’s one quart) of your must to make a starter, inspired by this, that you will later cold crash and decant to keep the malt flavour out. Though I do intend to use two 50 ml additions of this nutrient in an 18 liter (4.75 gallon) prickly pear wine I’m making right now; once when a third of the sugar is consumed and again when 2/3rd of the sugar is consumed. I hope that just a 100 ml isn’t enough to be detected in that much wine.

So here you go, non-first worlders without HBS and Amazon. A yeast nutrient that can be made at home with lots of labour and fuel consumed. I will say that my starter multiplied like crazy, but then again, this is my first time making a starter so I don’t have any baselines I can go off on here.

So guys, tell me, how did I do? I will be back online on Monday, so please forgive me if I can’t reply before then.

 

[Asmarino]

Woah, a whole weekend and no comments? How badly did I do?!

 

[Miraculix]

I probably would have just used boiled bread yeast tbh. The raisins don't bring anything to the table and I'm not sure about the rest. But if you had fun, why not?

 

[mac_1103]

Woah, a whole weekend and no comments?

I think that's just because there's a lot there and home made yeast nutrient is not something that comes up for most folks. I also think you might not need to do all of that. Just the boiled bread yeast will probably give you most (or all) of what you need, depending on how strong a wine you're trying to make.

 

[Broken Crow]

Just to back up a moment: You mention beer and you mention wine, so I'm wondering what it is that you're preparing to brew?
I can't comment on wine, but I know that with beers, unless you're doing a high-gravity beer there's rarely a need for extra nutrient. As above though; When I decided to try adding a nutrient I too just used bread yeast in the kettle... It turned out to make no real difference to my brew. As to your concoction itself, that's difficult to comment on especially without knowing what it's intended for. I've seen a number of home-made nutrients made with everything from mushrooms, fish-oil and pomegranites but that really is a niche area and there's only a small percentage of users on here that may have the feedback you're looking for, so a weekend really isn't that long a time.
So; tell us the 'what it's for' and the 'why you need it' part and maybe as the thread bounces you'll get the answers you need.

 

[An Ankoù]

Just type "brewing yeast nutrient" into the search field at Amazon.com and you'll get loads of offers.
In the absence of which, I think a teaspoonful of diammonium phosphate is probably all you need. If you want it for beer, leave some of the trub in the wort, too.

 

[Lampy]

I've heard of people using boiled yeast and/or tomato paste as a nutrient source. I tried using bread yeast once and it did allow my fermentation to go dry at about 14%ABV, so it probably did something good.

 

[robint]

Something I dont understand here??????? You boil up yeast - if you do that you kill the yeast. >80C kills all yeast.
So where did you get your yeast to pitch into your cooled wort?

are you confusing a yeast starter with a yeast nutrient

looks like you have used wild yeast? - which is every where. If you have cattle pooping in the street lots of wild wild yeast - and flies

dont understand this?

You must know how palm wine is made - just cut a strip out of the top heart of the palm tree so it bleeds. Collect the juice in a plastic bottle tied up there. After a few days it will be fermenting and a week its drinkable. Take it strain it bottle it for a few weeks till it stops fizzing, put in fridge served cold by your newest wife.

 

[An Ankoù]

Something I dont understand here??????? You boil up yeast - if you do that you kill the yeast. >80C kills all yeast.
So where did you get your yeast to pitch into your cooled wort?

are you confusing a yeast starter with a yeast nutrient

I think @Lampy meand that you get any old yeast, or some slurry from a previous brew and boil it to start breaking it down. That's the nutrient; you still have to pitch the wort with beer yeast.

 

[AlexKay]

I love this.

To be sure, this only makes sense if (1) like the OP, you have no access to brewing suppliers or Amazon, and (2) you're making mead or something, and not beer.

If you're making beer, the short answer about yeast nutrient is "no." Nutrients are what the malt is for.