Help me settle a debate: Under or Overpitch?

[rinhaak]

I'm brewing a Belgian - style tripel on Saturday. The recipe is here:

http://hopville.com/recipe/1235993/belgian-tripel-recipes/belg-tripel

I'm using 3787 yeast, and I created the starter yesterday. However, my brewing buddy and I are at a bit of a disagreement on pitching rates. He wants to under-pitch to try creating some fruitier flavors. I'm concerned that underpitching will result in off flavors. I want to pitch my entire starter.

Thoughts? I'm brewing a 3.5 gallon batch, so it's possible that a full starter would be overkill. Any ideas?

 

[EllisTX]

Why not use mrmalty and pitch the correct amount?

 

[arg]

I would strive to pitch the correct amount, using Mr. Malty as a reference.

Also...Why not brew twice..? Do it your way, then try it his way. See what's better.

 

[passedpawn]

Best to overpitch to make danged sure you get to your FG. If you used a lot of sugar might not matter.

Ferment warm and you'll get all the fruitiness you want.

 

[spearko520]

Best to overpitch to make danged sure you get to your FG. If you used a lot of sugar might not matter.

Ferment warm and you'll get all the fruitiness you want.

+1 - that strain goes off pretty hot anyway- i think temp is a better way to get fruit than underpitching

 

[frankstoneline]

Best to overpitch to make danged sure you get to your FG. If you used a lot of sugar might not matter.

Ferment warm and you'll get all the fruitiness you want.

This.
Let the yeast produce the flavors it does naturally (thats why you've selected a belgian strain after all).

 

[Maxkling]

This.
Let the yeast produce the flavors it does naturally (thats why you've selected a belgian strain after all).

+1, don't purposely stress the yeast... Choose a yeast that will fit your style. You might not only get fruity esters, but also fusel alcohols and other non-desired off flavors, key word OFF FLAVORS, not yeast esters.

 

[kingwood-kid]

Go Here: http://sciencebrewer.com/

 

[Backporchbrewery]

I under pitched a belgian dark strong once and the fusel alcohols was overwhelming. It didn't go away, tried some at 3 months and more after a year. It was a complete waste. I'd recommend never underpitching anything if possible.

 

[pabloj13]

Brewing buddy has been soundly defeated.

 

[DSmith]

I only do 3.5 gallon end-of-boil all grain batches and normally do a yeast starter (1L minimum, stirred, chilled & decanted). That volume of starter is overpitching by about 50% for 1.060 beers, mostly what I brew. No starter is underpitching by about 50%. The beer has been good and I've justified to myself that some overpitching is ok from the Mr Malty Proper Yeast Pitching Rates article:

"Yes, you can wait longer and completely ferment it out so you don't have to pitch the liquid, but if you're going to do that, you should use a larger starter and allow the fermentation to go complete cycle over several days, chill, decant the beer and pitch just the yeast."

For 1.091 OG, 3.5 gallon end of boil, I'd make a 1.5L stirred starter and slightly overpitch. If you oxygenate well and pitch at fermentation temperature or slightly below, my experience is that the lag time should be less than 8 hours for an ale with that quantity of yeast.

 

[TarheelBrew13]

I'm going to buck the trend and vote under pitch. Belgian esters and phenols make me happy.

To clarify, I'm not advocating stressing your yeast. There's a lot more o stressing a yeast than simply having a low population in the presence of a lot of food. The act of reproducing is what produces a lot of the flavors and aromas related to yeast. If they are in a hospitable environment with plenty of access to nutrients and oxygen, they won't be stressed no matter what the population count.

 

[xjmox14x]

I'm going to buck the trend and vote under pitch. Belgian esters and phenols make me happy.

To clarify, I'm not advocating stressing your yeast. There's a lot more o stressing a yeast than simply having a low population in the presence of a lot of food. The act of reproducing is what produces a lot of the flavors and aromas related to yeast. If they are in a hospitable environment with plenty of access to nutrients and oxygen, they won't be stressed no matter what the population count.

I think the consensus is this: There are many ways to stress your yeast to produce the esters and phenols you want (underpitch, high temps, low oxygenation, etc.). Anything that will stress the yeast a bit more. You CAN underpitch, however, one of the only ways (that I know of) to give you the esters you're looking for without having to worry about your yeast not munching down to the proper FG is raising the fermentation temp.

 

[phenry]

For a Tripel I wouldn't underpitch at all. If you fall short of a pretty low FG it won't be drinkable at all like it should be (i.e., dry). Pitch the proper amount around the mid to high-60s, then let the temp ramp up to help ester formation and making sure the yeast finishes out fermentation. You don't want to start off too hot and end up with a bunch of fusels.

 

[kingwood-kid]

I'm going to buck the trend and vote under pitch. Belgian esters and phenols make me happy.

To clarify, I'm not advocating stressing your yeast. There's a lot more o stressing a yeast than simply having a low population in the presence of a lot of food. The act of reproducing is what produces a lot of the flavors and aromas related to yeast. If they are in a hospitable environment with plenty of access to nutrients and oxygen, they won't be stressed no matter what the population count.

I'm with you, even if no one else is. If I use a Belgian yeast, it's because I want everything that comes with it. If i pitch per Mr. Malty and ferment cool, I start to approach US-05. To be clear, I'm not advocating a severe underpitch with 4-year-old slurry into nutrient-deficient wort. If you pitch half the recommended amount, the yeast will reproduce and will ferment your beer to an almost identical FG.

 

[pabloj13]

I'm with you, even if no one else is. If I use a Belgian yeast, it's because I want everything that comes with it. If i pitch per Mr. Malty and ferment cool, I start to approach US-05. To be clear, I'm not advocating a severe underpitch with 4-year-old slurry into nutrient-deficient wort. If you pitch half the recommended amount, the yeast will reproduce and will ferment your beer to an almost identical FG.

Even with a trippel?

 

[kingwood-kid]

Even with a trippel?

I think it will ferment it down to a similar fg; a lot of the fermentables in a Tripel are simple sugars. Now, that's not to say that this would produce an ideal taste. Tripels should, in the BJCP's words, be "soft...sneaky, not obvious." Of course, that is as much a product of which yeast you use and the temp you use it at as it is of pitch rate.

Pitching at the recommended rate will probably produce a beer that is preferred by most tasters. Tarheelbrew13 and I will be in the corner sipping our estery delights.

 

[rinhaak]

Thanks for all of the feedback! Really helpful!

But as things often go, the choice ended up being made for us:

It turns out our initial yeast pack was faulty or something (probably handled badly along the way), and the starter never took. I knew something was fishy when I made the starter, because the yeast smelled like awful.

So we made an emergency run to the homebrew shop, and picked up two packs of the yeast (it was all they had). So no matter what, we've under pitched by a significant margin. Not to mention, we got insane efficiency from the mash and wound up with an OG of 1.114. Yowza.

Had I not been dead tired at the time, I would have thought to add a little water and lower that OG back to the realm of a more reasonable 1.080 or so. But by this point it was 2am and I wasn't thinking straight.

Absolutely no idea what weird sort of "Imperial" Tripel I'm going to wind up with. It's definitely fermenting happily, so it will certainly turn into something. I'll keep you posted.

 

[g-star]

Wow! You under-pitched by at least 75%, and that's assumming 100% viability for the two packs you started with.

I would keep an eye on this one and warm it up as time goes on to avoid a stuck ferment.