Making and Canning Sterile Starter Wort

[nutty_gnome]

Outstanding Idea!

This cuts another step out of bottling day, and you can just use less of the Canned Primer if you need fewer volumes of CO2.

Yep. My pint jars have embossed ounce-volumes on them, so it was easy to just pour in the appropriate amount for a 4 gallon batch like I did a week ago.

I really like doing it like this as it saves some time but mostly a lot of running up and down stairs and temperature/sanitation management.

 

[nutty_gnome]

kgfitz, What you're saying would work, and you're right it will take a little longer to get everything up to temp. An extra couple of minutes would probably do well enough.

The disadvantage is that the wort will be that much darker after boiling it twice, and it's a whole lot more work. If you have any beer pouring skills at all, you can probably manage pouring the wort off and leave the break material in the jar after it settles out.

Remember, you're making yeast food at this point; not great beer.

+1. If you let the wort sit for any length of time, you can easily pour off clear wort into your starter and leave the trub behind. Also, a pound of light DME split 4 ways makes 4 quart jars of starter wort. Its the simplest thing to do if you have the pressure cannner.

 

[kgfitz]

thanks for the fast replays i am mashing right now from the pics. posted from before it looked like a lot of trub. I am going to do it as the OP has posted. The best thing I have lurned from HBT is to trust the advice from HBT.

thaks for the advice

fitz

 

[lamarguy]

The best thing I have lurned from HBT is to trust the advice from HBT.

Na, lurnin' is overrated.

 

[El Gertez]

Hi Folks. First time poster here.

I'm curious, for those who don't have a pressure cooker, could you boil the starter wort in a pot, transfer it to sterilized mason jars, seal them, and process them in a boiling water bath? If the wort is brought to a full boil before canning, I don't think it would have any remaining organisms that would need to be killed off in the canning process...

I've done this a couple of times with no issues so far, and a lot less break material!

 

[davealicious]

Two points i'd like to add to this:

I brew to 1.080, can in quarts, this will provide you with enough to make a 2l starter in a single jar. When i do this with DME I actually end up with 1800ml of 1040 wort when leaving the break behind.

If you "brew" your starter, boil, cool, then can, you'll have far less break. its a lot of extra steps though and totally silly unless you're bored...

 

[thekraken]

Hi Folks. First time poster here.

I'm curious, for those who don't have a pressure cooker, could you boil the starter wort in a pot, transfer it to sterilized mason jars, seal them, and process them in a boiling water bath? If the wort is brought to a full boil before canning, I don't think it would have any remaining organisms that would need to be killed off in the canning process...

I've done this a couple of times with no issues so far, and a lot less break material!

Nope. The process requires a pressure cooker. In a pressure cooker the boiling point of water can get up to 250F, while not underpressure only gets up to 212F. You need to get up to 250 to kill the bacteria that can create toxins that cause botulism and kill you.