Question about Starter for a barleywine

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pablo_t

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I'm getting ready to brew an American barleywine.. I'm trying to grow enough yeast (WLP001) to pitch into wort with an OG of 1.115. I pitched a vial into a gallon sized jug with 2 litres of 1040 wort about six days ago. After 30 hours I put it in the fridge to let all the yest drop for a couple of days. Last night I dumped out the beer and put an other 2 liters of wort on it and it immediatly started to krausen. It was already flowing out through the foil about an hour or two. It is breaking my heart to see some of that good yeast flow out. The foil still managed to stay on. What did I do wrong? Is it still good or are there any sanitization issues that are going to significantly adversly affect the beer?
 
You didn't really do anything wrong, it was just that that much yeast can really get going fast on a starter wort. Perhaps try it next time with some anti-foaming agent.

Sanitization issues from the overflow are fairly unlikely. I wouldn't worry about it.
 
I've had my starters overflow many times and have not had issues with infected yeast. It sucks to see all the good yeast go to waste, however. I now do starters in two containers:
1) 2000ml flask
2) 3gal (~11000ml) bucket

In the flask, I won't put more than 1500ml wort/yeast (the flask is probably ~2200ml).

In the bucket, I do 6000ml starters.

Neither of these overflow with those volumes.
 
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