I started the starter on Thursday, now it's Saturday and o am brewing. Do I shake it up and Chuck the whole thing on there or do I try and decant of some of the liquid first? Or is this one of those Chevy/Ford PC/Mac kind of things?
Pitching the starter
- Thread starter cmoewes
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Thanks. I've seen stuff about decanting it but didn't catch that part about letting it chill and settle out in that case.
BamaPhil
Well-Known Member
I've had this inner debate my last few brews. I was afraid of underpitching so I would chuck the whole thing in there. After pondering I realized around 10-12% of my batch was yeast starter.
For today's batch, my 1.5L starter chilled for about 36 hours. I decided to split the difference. I decanted about half the liquid and pitched the rest. I ended up with lower OG and volume than planned so it probably won't hurt if I dumped some yeast.
For today's batch, my 1.5L starter chilled for about 36 hours. I decided to split the difference. I decanted about half the liquid and pitched the rest. I ended up with lower OG and volume than planned so it probably won't hurt if I dumped some yeast.
I'd crash that starter, decant, warm up the slurry, then pitch.
Starter "beer" generally is rather awful...
Cheers!
Starter "beer" generally is rather awful...
Cheers!
I try to use the following process (when time and memory don't fail me):
1. The night before brew day (maybe a day or so sooner, depending on when I got the starter going), move the covered starter to a fridge to chill and drop the yeast.
2. Move it to my ferm chamber the morning of brewday while I am getting my gear out.
3. Once the mash is going, I decant all but about the last 1/4-inch of starter beer (or all of it if I had chilled enough to let the yeast form a nice, compact cake)
4. Add about 200-250 ml of fresh starter wort. I can my starters ahead of time in quart and pint mason jars. I usually do 10 gallon batches and often pitch 2 different yeast (1 in each 5-gal batch). That means I make 2 starters. Each starter gets half of a pint jar of fresh starter on the morning of brew day.
the starters go back into my fermentation fridge to acclimate to whatever temp I am fermenting that particular beer and to allow the small amount of starter to "wake them back up".
Since 200ml is negligible in the grand scheme of things, I usually toss that new starter in with the yeast when I pitch.
1. The night before brew day (maybe a day or so sooner, depending on when I got the starter going), move the covered starter to a fridge to chill and drop the yeast.
2. Move it to my ferm chamber the morning of brewday while I am getting my gear out.
3. Once the mash is going, I decant all but about the last 1/4-inch of starter beer (or all of it if I had chilled enough to let the yeast form a nice, compact cake)
4. Add about 200-250 ml of fresh starter wort. I can my starters ahead of time in quart and pint mason jars. I usually do 10 gallon batches and often pitch 2 different yeast (1 in each 5-gal batch). That means I make 2 starters. Each starter gets half of a pint jar of fresh starter on the morning of brew day.
the starters go back into my fermentation fridge to acclimate to whatever temp I am fermenting that particular beer and to allow the small amount of starter to "wake them back up".
Since 200ml is negligible in the grand scheme of things, I usually toss that new starter in with the yeast when I pitch.
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