Pitching on a yeast cake.

[baer19d]

I ferment my ales in the primary for three weeks. Would it be ok to pitch on the yeast cake after this long or is the yeast too old?

Thanks, Mike

 

[2drunk2]

I predict a flurry of yes and no's. I have a case of delicious beer that was pitched on to a yeast cake after 2 weeks in the primary.

If you can carbonate a beer after 3 weeks I assume the yeast is still active. So, I believe it will work.

The argument against will be science mumbo jumbo about over pitching yeast and best practices.

My advice would be to go for it.

 

[Yooper]

It's almost always going to be a huge overpitching, and unless you were going from something like a mild to a double IPA, I wouldn't do it. I've done it in the past (like 8 years ago), but now just use sanitized jars and pour the yeast cake into three or four jars and use it for multiple 10 gallon batches.

Something to think about: https://www.homebrewtalk.com/f163/why-not-pitch-your-yeast-cake-166221/

 

[eastoak]

it's just as easy to scoop out the desired quantity and pitch into fresh wort. the science behind over pitching yeast is not mumbo jumbo and i would guess most brewers, commercial and otherwise want to pitch as close to the optimum pitch as possible.