My First Starter Blew It's Top...Still Good??

[stp]

Hey guys, I decided to make a starter last night for the first time. Being the first time, I wasn't as prepared as I could have been and may have run into an issue.

I boiled some extra light DME in 2 liters of water for about 15 minutes. When I cooled it and went to put it in a growler (I don't have a flask) I realized quickly that I had very minimal head space left. I actually dumped a little to make more room and then pitched my yeast. Gave it a swirl a few times before bed but in the morning the tinfoil cap I put on was on the counter along with a bunch of my wort.

I'm not worried about the loss but about the possible contamination since my tinfoil was off for who knows how long during the night.

I cleaned up, sprayed the mouth of the growler as well as a new piece of tinfoil with starsan and covered it back up.

Think I'm still good to brew tonight and use it? Or should dump this one and start over?

Thanks for the input!

 

[jaycount]

Let the starter finish and take a look/smell. If it smells/looks like young beer, it's probably fine.

It's a bit of a gamble pitching it but I'd say it's more than likely ok.

 

[PurpleJeepXJ]

You will be fine... It happens

 

[Clementine]

+1 on check smell/taste you should be fine. If there was foam still pouring from the growler when you caught it you will be double OK wild yeast and bacteria can't crawl they can only float on the wind, as you had a volcano of foam coming out chances are you will be fine. Someone else best described it as his yeast crawling out of the flask!

I made a test when I had a few starters with yeast trying to crawl out of them where I caught the overflow, I was surprised to see how much escaped. The amount of yeast that crawled out was around 30-40% How much yeast did you need?

Clem

 

[stp]

Well it smelled fine so I used it. I brewed this beer twice before and it didn't smell off. Mr Malty says 210 billion so I pitched a smack pack into a 2 liter starter (recommended a 3 liter but I don't have the equipment for that). Like I said, I made this twice before and didn't use a starter and it turned out okay. I'll adjust for the next one and make sure I don't waste any. Hopefully at least the 100 billion from the original pack was in there and they all didn't crawl out!
Thanks for the responses.

 

[bigbeergeek]

Time to go buy a jug of Carlo Rossi wine. Mix the sweet white "chablis" 50/50 with sprite or fruit juice and you're golden. Then dump the rest down the drain when you can't stand it any longer. You'll get a nice cheap buzz AND a 4 liter vessel (perfect for starters of hefty size) at the same time...