Hop slurry in harvested yeast

[merlyone]

I brew a lot of hoppy beers and there’s always a same problem when harvesting a yeast. There’s too much hops in a slurry and I can’t get clean yeast out of it. The cans are getting too full.

just to make sure, is the active yeast in the middle of beer and the hop slurry or at the bottom of the can?

I like to dry hop without any bag but that would help I know.


Any tips?

 

[Miraculix]

Overbuild starters and save your yeast from there. You cannot really separate the yeast and hops anymore after pitching.

 

[merlyone]

Overbuild starters and save your yeast from there. You cannot really separate the yeast and hops really anymore after pitching.

That’s a good one! Thanks!

 

[ebbelwoi]

Another option is top-cropping. Verdant produces a nice thick krausen that can be skimmed off the top around day 3 of fermentation. You can then dry hop to your heart's delight.

 

[duncan_disorderly]

You can separate yeast from other stuff to a large extent by decanting. Leave a little beer on the yeast, swirl it all together and pour into a sterilised jar or similar. Leave 2 minutes to settle and then pour just the liquid into another sterilised vessel for storage. Yeast will remain in suspension much longer than hop and grain debris and you'll be surprised how much will settle out. And it will be protected by the hopped beer on top.

 

[Miraculix]

You will also separate the nicely flocculating cells, and throw them away with the hopp particles.... A bit of a trade-off.

 

[Gilbert Spinning Horse]

I always use a hop sack when dry hopping a beer I want to harvest the yeast from.

 

[duncan_disorderly]

You will also separate the nicely flocculating cells, and throw them away with the hopp particles.... A bit of a trade-off.

Maybe, maybe not. How long does it take a nicely flocculating yeast cell to flocculate?! And how many slow to flocculate yeast cells does it take to change a light bulb?

We need answers.

 

[Miraculix]

Maybe, maybe not. How long does it take a nicely flocculating yeast cell to flocculate?! And how many slow to flocculate yeast cells does it take to change a light bulb?

We need answers.

Depends. When I look at a09 pub, then a matter of seconds to a few minutes. The light bulb, depends if it's a German yeast or from somewhere else. German yeast needs less cells for the bulb change, as they are German and obviously more efficient.

 

[duncan_disorderly]

Depends. When I look at a09 pub, then a matter of seconds to a few minutes. The light bulb, depends if it's a German yeast or from somewhere else. German yeast needs less cells for the bulb change, as they are German and obviously more efficient.

I'm not sure we can see what is settling, yeast or other stuff?

I guess German yeast won't need to change light bulbs as often, too.

 

[Miraculix]

I'm not sure we can see what is settling, yeast or other stuff?

I guess German yeast won't need to change light bulbs as often, too.

I literally saw agitated a09 settle out in my glass in about thirty seconds, leaving the beer clear. So my guess is that the highly flocculent part of a big number of yeasties will settle out in a similar timeframe. But only the high flocc part....

 

[duncan_disorderly]

I literally saw agitated a09 settle out in my glass in about thirty seconds, leaving the beer clear. So my guess is that the highly flocculent part of a big number of yeasties will settle out in a similar timeframe. But only the high flocc part....

Ok. But I bet the stuff we don't want settles faster. Probably.

 

[Tom R]

You can separate yeast from other stuff to a large extent by decanting. Leave a little beer on the yeast, swirl it all together and pour into a sterilised jar or similar. Leave 2 minutes to settle and then pour just the liquid into another sterilised vessel for storage. Yeast will remain in suspension much longer than hop and grain debris and you'll be surprised how much will settle out. And it will be protected by the hopped beer on top.

Something tall and narrow, like this graduated cylinder, works really well for this.
I let my pellet hops swim freely, so this is used frequently.