Imperial Yeast. Watch out!!

[TheMilkMan]

Went to open on of these babies in my fermentation(laundry) room and BOOM!!!!!!!!!!!! Yeast everywhere. I mean like, shot across the room, hit the wall, and covered everything in its way. Their website says to shake for 15 seconds before opening, maybe a bad idea? Luckily I had two, and was fermenting in a bucket. Held second over open bucket, open and BOOM!!! Yeast everywhere. Except this time a controlled explosion into the bucket.

sigh...not sure if I pitched enough yeast now. Let's hope the batch turns out.

Anyhow, I'm sure the yeast is fine but watch out and plan for it.

 

[NoIguanaForZ]

Uh, what website? Which babies?

 

[TheMilkMan]

http://www.imperialyeast.com/

 

[BaylessBrewer]

$11.99 each plus $8.99 shipping @ greatfermentations.com. Think I'll have to pass until it's sold locally

 

[Jwin]

Bummer.

 

[sudbuddy]

Isn't that the guy that used to work at Wyeast and left to do his own thing?

 

[BrewerBrad82]

It is indeed. He also owns a mobile beer canning line company.

 

[sudbuddy]

Those mobile canning guys are geniuses. Freakin gold mine

 

[BrewerBrad82]

If I remember correctly his company is called Craft Canning. They run out of Portland.

 

[wallybangbang]

I saw this yeast pop up at more beer in concord ca. Is it any good? Aside from the exploding packages mentioned above.

 

[flars]

Looked at the instructions for preparing to pitch. Reminds me of White Lab vials that exploded.

I would remove from frig
sanitize
crack seal and cover with sanitized plastic wrap
let warm to room temperature for CO2 to off gas
hold thumb over cracked seal, swirl and pitch
add cooled wort, swirl and pitch remainder.

 

[Biobrewer]

Looked at the instructions for preparing to pitch. Reminds me of White Lab vials that exploded.



I would remove from frig

sanitize

crack seal and cover with sanitized plastic wrap

let warm to room temperature for CO2 to off gas

hold thumb over cracked seal, swirl and pitch

add cooled wort, swirl and pitch remainder.

Glad the White Labs packaging is slowly phasing into a breathable type to vent buildup of gas. Very excited for TheYeast Bay to get into the new packaging. While the vials sometimes had gas buildup, the one nice thing about the vials was that you could vent to them and then close it back up until the foam receded, and then continued to vent and close until there's no more gas. The fact that you can't close the can back up is obviously one of the major design flaws in this particular packaging.

 

[Wiscohio_brewer]

I used the Joystick yeast from Imperial and same thing happened with me. Luckily most of the yeast was consolidated in the bottom so most of it stayed in the can. Why the hell would you tell people to shake the can when it explodes all over the place?

 

[Rivenin]

yeah, don't shake the cans LOL.
turn it upside down in the fridge,
before you're ready to pitch, take it out and gently swirl it around a bit to dislodge the yeast, sanitize and crack it open over the funnel or bucket. right out of the fridge it's pretty minimal.

Also, used the A10 darkness... brewed a nut brown with it that is only 3 weeks old and fantastic.
dumped a 1.082 stout ontop of the cake, so far it's tasting awesome... hot... but awesome, currently sitting at 1.022, about to get some oak cubes and bourbon in a week.

 

[Yooper]

Isn't that the guy that used to work at Wyeast and left to do his own thing?

Didn't I introduce you two at NHC in San Diego? I know I was standing outside talking to him when I met you. Jason is a super cool guy, and I like him alot.

I still haven't tried the yeast, though! I got some nice swag at NHC, but have never seen the Imperial yeast semi-locally or in places I buy online (like Ritebrew).

I can't wait to try it- but I will have to remember not to shake the can!

 

[DrankGoodness]

I really like their yeast. My shop here in Portland says NOT to shake it (and that the directions on the can are being changed). Don't need a full blown starter, only a vitality starter with their yeast.

 

[giraffe]

Yeah their FAQ says not to shake, guess theyve changed it. http://www.imperialyeast.com/faq/

They have a few strains which are only available as wyeast seasonals, B51 is the Belgian Stout Hercules strain, L17 is the munich II Augustiner strain, B53 is Orval, and they are big pitches and local for me.

 

[sudbuddy]

Didn't I introduce you two at NHC in San Diego? I know I was standing outside talking to him when I met you. Jason is a super cool guy, and I like him alot.

Yes, you did. He seemed pretty cool. I'd love to try his yeast at some point, but I'll wait for a good opportunity

 

[moors]

Interesting instructions, pitch straight from the refrigerator. No warming to room temperature! No starter batches! No flask and magnetic stirrer plate! I'm looking forward to trying. My local shop carries Wyeast and Imperial. They look like little red bull cans. Don't drink too much homebrew and accidentally reach grab one of these instead. Probiotics!

 

[Biobrewer]

I really like their yeast. My shop here in Portland says NOT to shake it (and that the directions on the can are being changed). Don't need a full blown starter, only a vitality starter with their yeast.

Don't know about you, but I think it's pretty much the same amount of time and energy for me to make a 500 mL "vitality starter" (?) as a 2 L "full blown" starter. Also unclear how pitching a bunch of cells into very little wort for a "vitality starter" actually helps yeast health. This illustrates why, in my opinion, packing in more cells for homebrewers is not as value added a proposition as some would think given the price of these cultures. If you're making a starter either way, why not produce more of the cells you need immediately before fermentation with a bigger starter that maybe costs an extra buck over a smaller starter? Freshly made cells in a large starter will also undoubtedly be higher vitality than cells that are pitched at a higher cell density into a small starter where competition for nutrients and carbon source is much greater.

Also, given the same best by date on a package containing 100 vs. 200 billion cells, past a certain point you'll need a large starter for both either way. All you've done is paid 2x as much money for 2x the number of dead cells in the 200 billion cell package, and you're still stuck making a large starter.

 

[afr0byte]

Don't know about you, but I think it's pretty much the same amount of time and energy for me to make a 500 mL "vitality starter" (?) as a 2 L "full blown" starter. Also unclear how pitching a bunch of cells into very little wort for a "vitality starter" actually helps yeast health. This illustrates why, in my opinion, packing in more cells for homebrewers is not as value added a proposition as some would think given the price of these cultures. If you're making a starter either way, why not produce more of the cells you need immediately before fermentation with a bigger starter that maybe costs an extra buck over a smaller starter? Freshly made cells in a large starter will also undoubtedly be higher vitality than cells that are pitched at a higher cell density into a small starter where competition for nutrients and carbon source is much greater.

Also, given the same best by date on a package containing 100 vs. 200 billion cells, past a certain point you'll need a large starter for both either way. All you've done is paid 2x as much money for 2x the number of dead cells in the 200 billion cell package, and you're still stuck making a large starter.

Ah, the dangers of the exbeeriment stuff. At least I assume that's where the vitality starter phrasing came from in his post.

 

[Biobrewer]

Ah, the dangers of the exbeeriment stuff. At least I assume that's where the vitality starter phrasing came from in his post.

I knew I saw the term "vitality starter" somewhere before. It wasn't on Marshall's Brulosophy site, which is actually a very nice source of information, I think it was actually in the Water book. Now that I see the definition of a vitality starter as a starter that is essentially run for a very short period of time rather than being a very small size, the term makes a little more sense. Yes, the health of the yeast will go up when pitched into a starter if they are not given the chance to exhaust the carbon source. However, I think all starters should be "vitality starters" in that they should never be allowed to completely be exhausted of a carbon source and the focus is supposed to be on creating new healthy cells, not fermentation. I typically run my Saccharomyces starters for 18-24 hours on a stirplate, and my Brettanomyces starters for 48-72 hours. The viability is always quite high (probably because I'm often propping from colonies and all the cells were essentially just produced) and the vitality I would think is very high given the very quick start to fermentation I usually see (vitality is, however, very hard to measure quantitatively).

That brings me back to the higher cell counts for home brewers as a value added proposition. Let's say we have a 100 and 200 billion yeast cell pack, both 3 months old or 32.6% viability. Therefore, they contain an estimated 32.6 and 65.2 billion cells respectively. Let's say we're shooting for 360 billion cells. In this case, one would need a 2.2 L starter (1.037) for the 100 billion yeast cell pack vs. a 2 L starter (1.037) for the 200 billion yeast cell pack. That's right, another 0.2 L of water and 0.74 oz of DME will get you the cells you need from the 100 billion yeast cell pack as compared to the 200 billion yeast cell pack. Perhaps there is some value added if the yeast is incredibly fresh, but that value proposition fades with every passing hour beyond the packaging date. Even then, if using the exact same example as above except each pack were 97% viable, the 100 billion yeast cell pack would require a 1.75 L starter and the 200 billion yeast cell pack would require a 1.2 L starter. So, in that case still only an extra 0.55 L of water and 2.05 oz DME to get the necessary cells. All calculations were done on this site.

 

[TheMadKing]

I knew I saw the term "vitality starter" somewhere before. It wasn't on Marshall's Brulosophy site, which is actually a very nice source of information, I think it was actually in the Water book. Now that I see the definition of a vitality starter as a starter that is essentially run for a very short period of time rather than being a very small size, the term makes a little more sense. Yes, the health of the yeast will go up when pitched into a starter if they are not given the chance to exhaust the carbon source. However, I think all starters should be "vitality starters" in that they should never be allowed to completely be exhausted of a carbon source and the focus is supposed to be on creating new healthy cells, not fermentation. I typically run my Saccharomyces starters for 18-24 hours on a stirplate, and my Brettanomyces starters for 48-72 hours. The viability is always quite high (probably because I'm often propping from colonies and all the cells were essentially just produced) and the vitality I would think is very high given the very quick start to fermentation I usually see (vitality is, however, very hard to measure quantitatively).

That brings me back to the higher cell counts for home brewers as a value added proposition. Let's say we have a 100 and 200 billion yeast cell pack, both 3 months old or 32.6% viability. Therefore, they contain an estimated 32.6 and 65.2 billion cells respectively. Let's say we're shooting for 360 billion cells. In this case, one would need a 2.2 L starter (1.037) for the 100 billion yeast cell pack vs. a 2 L starter (1.037) for the 200 billion yeast cell pack. That's right, another 0.2 L of water and 0.74 oz of DME will get you the cells you need from the 100 billion yeast cell pack as compared to the 200 billion yeast cell pack. Perhaps there is some value added if the yeast is incredibly fresh, but that value proposition fades with every passing hour beyond the packaging date. Even then, if using the exact same example as above except each pack were 97% viable, the 100 billion yeast cell pack would require a 1.75 L starter and the 200 billion yeast cell pack would require a 1.2 L starter. So, in that case still only an extra 0.55 L of water and 2.05 oz DME to get the necessary cells. All calculations were done on this site.

I agree with that ^.

I am curious about your opinion of doing both traditional starter, and a mini starter or vitality starter on brew day.

I usually warm my starter yeast cake and throw in 500 mL of fresh DME wort and put it back on the stir plate for a couple hours.

I do this because it seems to help the yeast return to a metabolically active condition faster which reduces lag time. I have done tests with and without these mini starters and it seems to cut the lag time in half.

Taste-wise though I haven't been able to notice a difference, so the only added benefit is reduced lag time and therefore reduced infection risk IMO.

 

[TheMadKing]

Ah, the dangers of the exbeeriment stuff. At least I assume that's where the vitality starter phrasing came from in his post.

I would hardly call anything Marshall does dangerous as he explicitly states his statistical significance and always reiterates the fact that a single experiment is always inconclusive. It's hard to ignore the merit of his methods and the fact that some of his results are interesting and worth replication.

 

[afr0byte]

I knew I saw the term "vitality starter" somewhere before. It wasn't on Marshall's Brulosophy site, which is actually a very nice source of information, I think it was actually in the Water book. Now that I see the definition of a vitality starter as a starter that is essentially run for a very short period of time rather than being a very small size, the term makes a little more sense. Yes, the health of the yeast will go up when pitched into a starter if they are not given the chance to exhaust the carbon source. However, I think all starters should be "vitality starters" in that they should never be allowed to completely be exhausted of a carbon source and the focus is supposed to be on creating new healthy cells, not fermentation. I typically run my Saccharomyces starters for 18-24 hours on a stirplate, and my Brettanomyces starters for 48-72 hours. The viability is always quite high (probably because I'm often propping from colonies and all the cells were essentially just produced) and the vitality I would think is very high given the very quick start to fermentation I usually see (vitality is, however, very hard to measure quantitatively).

That brings me back to the higher cell counts for home brewers as a value added proposition. Let's say we have a 100 and 200 billion yeast cell pack, both 3 months old or 32.6% viability. Therefore, they contain an estimated 32.6 and 65.2 billion cells respectively. Let's say we're shooting for 360 billion cells. In this case, one would need a 2.2 L starter (1.037) for the 100 billion yeast cell pack vs. a 2 L starter (1.037) for the 200 billion yeast cell pack. That's right, another 0.2 L of water and 0.74 oz of DME will get you the cells you need from the 100 billion yeast cell pack as compared to the 200 billion yeast cell pack. Perhaps there is some value added if the yeast is incredibly fresh, but that value proposition fades with every passing hour beyond the packaging date. Even then, if using the exact same example as above except each pack were 97% viable, the 100 billion yeast cell pack would require a 1.75 L starter and the 200 billion yeast cell pack would require a 1.2 L starter. So, in that case still only an extra 0.55 L of water and 2.05 oz DME to get the necessary cells. All calculations were done on this site.

Presumably you mean the yeast book? It seems odd that the water book would mention it.

 

[afr0byte]

I would hardly call anything Marshall does dangerous as he explicitly states his statistical significance and always reiterates the fact that a single experiment is always inconclusive. It's hard to ignore the merit of his methods and the fact that some of his results are interesting and worth replication.

I'm not necessarily saying the experiments are dangerous in and of themselves. It's the frequent use of them as more than a single data point that is dangerous. Things like the oxygen versus no oxygen experiment or the direct pitch versus rehydration. It can be measured that you get more and/or healthier yeast when rehydrating/adding oxygen. So it seems silly to not do those things, even if you might be OK not doing them.

 

[TheMadKing]

I'm not necessarily saying the experiments are dangerous in and of themselves. It's the frequent use of them as more than a single data point that is dangerous. Things like the oxygen versus no oxygen experiment or the direct pitch versus rehydration. It can be measured that you get more and/or healthier yeast when rehydrating/adding oxygen. So it seems silly to not do those things, even if you might be OK not doing them.

Ah but you're forgetting the end result that we are measuring: beer flavor

It can be measured that those things DO unequivocally improve yeast health, but the experiments are designed to test whether or not those things actually affect the (undeniably subjective) flavor of a finished beer.

 

[afr0byte]

Ah but you're forgetting the end result that we are measuring: beer flavor

It can be measured that those things DO unequivocally improve yeast health, but the experiments are designed to test whether or not those things actually affect the (undeniably subjective) flavor of a finished beer.

Again though, they're one data point and some of the time they're one person away from statistical significance. So it seems likely some people did notice a difference.

 

[TheMadKing]

Again though, they're one data point and some of the time they're one person away from statistical significance. So it seems likely some people did notice a difference.

100% agree, though different didn't necessarily mean better. That's my only issue with Marshall's experiments. The panelists are told to pick the different beer, not the beer they prefer. So his experiments are useful for determining whether or not a modified variable impacts flavor, but not whether or not they "improve" beer by public consensus (since preference is even more subjective than taste)

 

[DarkStarNJ]

Did you open cold or room temp?