Making a starter in a time pinch...

[Stevesauer]

Hello. With tomorrow being the only day I can brew for a while, is set out to buy my yeast and prepare a starter this morning, only to find the lhbs closed. If I make a starter as soon as they open, would the resulting 8 hours between prepping the starter and concluding the brew day be enough time to be of any benefit? If yes, should I decrease starter size from my usual 2 liters to 1? Or could I safely put the cooled wort in the fermenter and seal it and pitch tomorrow after giving the starter more time? Would that leave the wort vulnerable to bacterial and or wild yeast infection? OG should be under 1.050, so I could probably get away with not using one, but can't bring myself to do it. Thanks in advance.

 

[SeeMont]

For me, I am not expert, I have never used a starter. I tend to use dry yeast and I do hydrate though. I have brewed over 1.075 doing this with no problem what so ever. I have used two packages with the high gravity batches.

 

[kh54s10]

The short time would be better than nothing.
If you left the wort for later you do increase the risk of infection.
You really should tailor the size of your starter to the gravity of the wort.
To use a 2 liter starter every time means you are likely under pitching some and over pitching others.
For this smallish beer I would think 1 liter would usually be plenty, but since it will have a short time???


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[troy2000]

One more reason I've only used dry yeasts so far. Although I'm sure that'll change somewhere down the line...

 

[boydster]

I do overnight no-chills regularly. If I'm transferring into a bucket to ferment, I transfer while the wort is still hot (~200°F) and seal it up until cool. If I'm using a carboy, I cover my kettle and wrap it in aluminum foil or plastic wrap to seal it until I transfer to the carboy. It works fine, and that process would allow your starter more time to finish.

 

[AerationStation]

If you're going to do it I would do a 1L starter and pitch that bad Larry at high Krausen (our as close as you can). You won't get much growth but you'll prep the yeast for their new home. Cool thing about this is that if you're on a stir plate those yeast will be pretty well set on o2 (having no time to really bud out)

 

[Nightstrife]

I just did a batch and I didn't have time to do a proper starter. So I mashed some spare grain and made about 1.75 liters of wort, cooled it and pitched my yeast (wpl001). I continued with my brew day shaking the 2l soda bottle it was in. By the time I pitched it was about 12 hours of starter time. I cannot cool faster as of yet. But by the time I pitched my 2l starter would get rock hard after about 15 min so I knew I had alive and very active yeasties.

This has been happy and bubbling away for about 4 days now. I'm sure you will be fine with a "short" starter even if underpitched slightly.

 

[dbkdev]

Toss a couple packs of dry yeast. Did exactly this today on a 1.072 beer for the same reasons. No starter needed, just dehydrated.

 

[Stevesauer]

Thanks for all the replies. This discussion has got me thinking about starter sizes in general. The last batch I brewed was 1.090 OG. I prepped a 2l starter and it stopped bubbling after about a day. Though this lack of visible bubbling could be in part because I use a 3/8 tube directly into the grommet on the lid and it allows more gas to escape faster. I had some explosions on my first batch and have done this ever since. This has been the case with all my beers (I've only done 5). I'm assuming that because I always use a 2l starter, my lower OG beers (1.070 and lower) finish fermenting early because I overpitched. Conversely, my higher OG beers are underpitched and get" stuck". This would explain a lot. That brings me to another question. When utilizing 2 step propagation to make a starter, which it appears I have to, is it acceptable to refrigerate the starter to expedite sedimentation before the step up? Logic tells me no, but I've read to do that. Awesome info from you guys, by the way.

 

[timdsmith72]

A couple of times, I've ladled out a couple of cups of boiling wort, chilled it, added a bit of RO water, added yeast, then stuck it on the stir plate. Then I have chilled the wort and stuck it in the chest freezer. (Fermentation chamber)
Pitched the starter first thing the next morning. Seems to work ok.

EDIT: No need to decant with this method either since the starter is made with wort you're fermenting any way.


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[NeoBrew]

I would recommend the short duration starter also. It will get them up and running for your pitch.

As far as starter size, you really can't go wrong with Jamil's calculator...

http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

 

[Stevesauer]

Thanks all. I've learned quite a bit from this thread. Not only from the answers given, but some of the info stated led me to do some research i wouldn't have thought of otherwise. As always, this is the place for answers.

 

[FarmerTed]

I'd just buy two smack packs (maybe three, if they're old), and call it good. I don't think you'd have a problem with a 1.050 wort.

 

[CraigKing]

I would recommend the short duration starter also. It will get them up and running for your pitch.

As far as starter size, you really can't go wrong with Jamil's calculator...

http://www.mrmalty.com/calc/calc.html

Tried using this calculator using the dry yeast tab. Is there a default volume of water that calculator uses? It doesn't specify??



EDIT: Nvm, I think I figured it out. It shows the volume of water under the liquid yeast tab.


So what happens if I want to make a starter with dry yeast, but want to use water? Do I use the same amount of water recommended for the liquid yeast?

 

[FarmerTed]

People usually don't do starters with dry yeast, because it's generally cheaper than liquid yeast, and you get a much higher cell-count (220 billion in a 11 g pack). It lasts much longer when refrigerated than liquid yeast does as well. If you're gonna do a starter, re-hydrate it, then pitch that into the starter wort. But, it's much easier just to pitch the right amount of rehydrated yeast.

 

[boydster]

You just rehydrate dry yeast in an equal amount of water by weight (11.5 grams of yeast with 115 ml of water, or roughly 1/2 cup).

 

[CraigKing]

Don't you add some DME into it too???

 

[boydster]

For dry yeast? No. It seems counter-intuitive at first, but adding a sugar source to the hydrating water will actually hurt the yeast more than it will help.

From the Dry Yeast FAQ:

Do I need to rehydrate dry yeast before pitching into my wort?

In a word: yes. If you don't rehydrate your dry yeast before pitching, you may end up killing 50% of the yeast in the package which could increase both lag time and the risk of other bugs growing a stronger colony in your wort. The remaining yeast will be stressed, increasing the chance that you will notice off-flavors in your final product. Further, the remaining yeast will need to divide more times to reach the ideal colony size, virtually guaranteeing a greater presence of ester flavors.

When the yeast cell is first rehydrated, it has no way to control what it absorbs or what leaches out of it. It needs a chance to rebuild its cell walls before it control those things. By adding the yeast directly to the wort (effectively rehydrating it in wort), the yeast cell will be flooded with sugars and other compounds that it isn't ready to process.

And:

How do I properly rehydrate dry yeast?

From “Yeast” by Chris White and Jamil Zainasheff:

Every yeast strain has its own optimum rehydration process, but the basic procedure is as follows:
1. Warm the dry yeast to room temperature.
2. In a sanitized container, prepare an amount of sterile tap water at 105*F (41*C) equal to 10 times the weight of the yeast (10 ml/g of yeast).
3. Sprinkle the dry yeast on top of the water, trying to avoid setting up large, dry clumps. Let it sit for 15 minutes, then gently stir.
4. Once the yeast has reconstituted, gentle stir once again to form a cream, and let sit for another 5 minutes.
5. Carefully and slowly, adjust the temperature of the yeast to within 15*F (8*C) of the wort temperature.
6. Pitch the resultant cream into the fermentation vessel, ideally as soon as possible.

If you properly rehydrate your dry yeast, you'll get about 200 billion live cells. That's double what you'll get from even the freshest vial of liquid yeast and is sufficient for most 5-gallon ale batches. If you need more cells than that for your beer, it's generally best to just get an extra packet due to the low cost and ease.

If you are going to make a starter with dry yeast, you need to hydrate it first. You also need to consider that, for the best viability and vitality, you want to make sure all of the yeast cells go through at least one doubling. That ensures you get some young, very healthy daughter cells and you aren't just feeding (and aging) the yeast cells you already have. So if you are starting with 200 billion cells, your starter should really be targeting 400+ billion cells. That's a lot. If you are planning on harvesting some of them to save for another time, great, but consider this: how much time and money are you spending on building a starter big enough to propagate 400 billion cells vs. the cost of a second packet of yeast?

 

[CraigKing]

Interesting. I wish I had read that before making my starter with DME yesterday.

I hope I didn't harm the little guys. I did use 2 packages of Safale though, so hopefully they will flourish.

 

[GotDrunkThenLost]

This may be a bit of a daft question, if I've got 48 hours to get a starter done (my DME arrives Wednesday and I'm brewing Friday) I'm expecting that would have enough time to develop a Krausen, if I'm not going to have time to cold crash how do I get the top fermenting yeast out (assuming I'll be using a soda bottle or something similar) and leave the wort behind?

 

[NeoBrew]

Crash it or pitch the whole thing. Right?


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